As I sat down at this year’s Serpentine Pavilion, I overheard a curious exchange. ‘You mustn’t create art within art,’ said an invigilator frostily. He was telling off Fred Pilbrow, an architect, who had been taking in the Pavilion’s sociable atmosphere with friends and painting a watercolour of the scene. They proceeded to enter a perverse negotiation as the invigilator struggled with the theoretical parameters of his orders; apparently the watercolour may stain the furniture but dry media like pencils aren’t allowed either; actually, all art-making is not allowed in any of the exhibitions, ‘but photography is OK’.
The timber structure has been stained in a shade of brown that is as convincing as a spray tan
The subject of this exchange, Fred’s contraband watercolour, depicted people in passionate conversation across a table, which ironically is what this year’s Pavilion was designed to encourage. As part of the Serpentine Gallery’s annual patronage of a prominent architect, this year they have chosen the French-Lebanese architect Lina Ghotmeh to design a temporary structure for the summer months, housing a café just outside the Gallery’s south building in Kensington Gardens.
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