The Celestial Sublime

Continuing a regular collaboration with the Viennese magazine architektur.aktuell, in this month's issue I contribute a feature on Dominque Perrault's Olympic Tennis Center in Madrid: The Magic Box, architektur.aktuell, October, 2009, pages 54 - 65.

"When seen from inside the vast open spaces of the stadiums, as their movement gradually exposes the infinite blue of Spain's summer sky, the roofs' opening acquires the solemn ceremony of a primitive religious rite.... Well-framed by the elegant formal clarity of Perrault's design, with its clean structural rhythms and luminous spatiality, this unveiling of the celestial sublime packages the sky-viewing epiphanies of American artist James Turrell for a mass audience."
 
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Photo by DC.