The Davidson Center is a museum located in the Old City of Jerusalem, woven into the archaeological excavation site of an Umayyan palace at the Southwestern corner of the Temple Mount. Our encounter with such a project set in such a major site of Jerusalem cast a sharp light on the complexities of form versus meaning, universal versus regional, and in particular – the tension between the site’s monumentality and the interaction of the diverse cultures that left their footprint on this monumental site.
We sought an architectural language that could strike a precise dialogue with the surroundings, the skyline of the walls, and the gravity of the ancient stone remains. A language that would form a coexistence with the limestone landscape and the inimitable Jerusalem light. In a location where each epoch had eradicated the marks of its precursors, we were looking for the possibility of reconciliation. We strove towards a state where the new observes the old with love and reverence, touching it and weaving through it, generating surprises and stimulating new situations.
Creating a space were these different and often adversary cultures, could coexist both in time and in place. The Davidson Center is a place to experience in motion. We wished to provide the visitor with a well-orchestrated experience, a path of several stages: a dramatic entrance, a last glance at the world outside, and a plunge into the depth of the earth. The inner journey coincides with a loss of orientation which intensifies the experience. At journey’s end, the visitor climbs back to the surface and sees the surroundings with new eyes.
In contradiction of the timeless stone remains the museum keeps changing and evolving, hosting and displaying new findings and presenting recent research such as the new interactive model of the Umayyad palace, and a planned coin exhibition of Sasany and Fatimy treasures.
The process of design and execution flowed in cycles between site, office work-desk, archaeologists, and builders. This circular movement consisted of a continual search for strategies to adapt the 1500 year-old space to its new function. How does one transform an antique storage basement into an innovative museum, containing sophisticated logistic systems, built to accommodate large masses of visitors, and bound to the strictest safety regulations? All of these factors dictated endless casting about for the perfect marriage between old and new. As the work progressed it became apparent that the key to the design was in setting up a fine balance between completely submerging the structure underground, and marking new traces on the surface, hints of the subterranean levels underneath.
Thus, only two elements emerge above the plane surface: a transparent glass structure enveloping the Hall of Arches magnifying the mass of the ancient wallsand The Oculus a unique architectural element, built of steel and glass, hinting at the existence of a 21St century structure underground; The inner structure is made of ultra-light material totally detached from the existing walls highlights the time-strata of the stone; the big roof’s geometry and technology, as they meet the remains of ancient structures rooted in the ground, amplify the plastic and organic nature of the walls. The Davidson center as an archeological museum shows the site’s many layers of cultures and time and is now opening a new Virtual educational study room for the Umayyad period- remainings of which are hosting this new structure.
The Davidson Center aspires to tell a tale of many eras, about the shifting fortunes of one particular location, about a historical crossroads in the annals of nations – all from the various viewpoints of many religions and cultures. We hope we are not too far from a day when tranquility will grace our region, and the Museum will be able to fulfill its vocation as a place of meeting, a place of peace.
