A library may be a place for silence, but the David Chipperfield exhibit attempted to come in with a bang.

To celebrate the opening of the new Des Moines Public Library, a free print gallery exhibition of British architect David Chipperfield will be shown through May 7 at the Des Moines Art Center.

The exhibition will feature Chipperfield’s three most recent projects, including the Figge Art Museum in Davenport and the third island for San Michele, the cemetery island of Venice. The third project is the Des Moines Public Library itself, with a 96-inch-long model of the library on display.

Although the new library is being shown in print form at the Art Center, people will be able to step inside the real thing at the grand opening April 8. The new structure is replacing the older Des Moines library with improvements both physically and aesthetically with a budget of more than $48 million. According to the museum’s Web site, the building is designed to blend into the surrounding park setting and become “a library within a park.” The library was made possible through the 10-year Des Moines Public Library Capital Campaign to raise funds for enhancing the entire Des Moines library system.

To discuss the finer points of the exhibit, a free gallery talk will feature Amy Worthen, curator of prints for the Art Center, and Brett Mendenhall of Herbert Lewis Kruse Blunck Architecture, project manager for the library project. The talk will take place at the Art Center print gallery on 2 p.m. Sunday.

– Rob Lombardi