Tate Modern unveils pyramid tower

Tate Modern has unveiled its new extension, a pyramid-like tower housing cavernous gallery spaces, ahead of its official opening.

The 200ft (65m) structure, boasting panoramic views of London, is part of a £260m revamp of the world-famous art museum.

It is being billed as the UK's most important new cultural building since the British Library, reports BBC News.

More than half of the solo displays are dedicated to women artists.

At Tuesday's launch event, Frances Morris, Tate Modern's new director, promised a weekend of "discovery and celebration" when the new building opens to the public on Friday.

"As we have been building the new Tate Modern, the curators... have been building the collection," she said. "You will find more international art, more art by women and great new installations."

She added the representation of women artists had "substantially increased".

"There was a huge deficit in our collecting prior to 2000 - when we opened 17% of the art on display was by women.

"Now 50% of the solo rooms are works by women such as Phyllida Barlow and Louise Bourgeois."

The new 10-storey building, known as the Switch House, includes three new gallery levels and a panoramic roof terrace.

It allows 60% more artworks from the Tate collection to go on show.

Tate director Sir Nicholas Serota expressed delight that the building work had been completed during a period of recession.

"Our aim is to be local, global, to have relationships with communities close to us and those across the world," he said.

The project was undertaken by architects Herzog & de Meuron, who transformed the derelict Bankside Power Station into Tate Modern in 2000.

The new Switch House rises almost 65 metres to the south of Tate Modern's huge Turbine Hall.

The windows and the viewing terrace appear as "cuts" in the surface which is clad with 336,000 bricks that mirror the look of the original building.

The tower is built above the former power station's subterranean oil tanks which were converted into performance spaces in time for the 2012 Olympics.