Dulwich Picture Gallery

An expedition with one of our best clients to pay a visit to the mausoleum designed by one of our heroes at BYRGA GENIHT — John Soane.

From the outside, the building looks a full century younger than its true age of the 1810s. Inside, a Georgian interior swells its lungs far wider than the classical temples that inspired it ever could. The mausoleum sits like a jewel opposite the entrance lobby, orange light pouring down from carefully selected coloured glass. We visited the space as a relatively recent attempt at a phenomenon we wish to build back into profound spaces — the light show. There is something mesmerising about having gloom down at human level, with light filling the space above your head.

The chamber is kept free of paintings, leaving the observer alone in their thoughts, surrounded by (occupied) sarcophagi. The mimic bronze doors and Imperial porphyry (the significance of which is discussed in James' Whitehall lecture), do pluck the room out of linear time as the space envelops you.

In 2018, Dulwich Picture Gallery announced that they were going to experiment with hanging their paintings upside-down, but thankfully, there were no such April Fools pranks today.