The Empty Dwelling, the Vain Tower and the Mad Colonist, 2008
Skulpturenpark Berlin_Zentrum sits on 62 vacant lots of downtown real estate owned by various private companies and individuals. It is an urban void which was formerly part of the "Mauerstreifen," the militarized zone within the Berlin Wall, but is now overgrown with weeds. The land remains vacant to this day. With approximately 5 hectares of open lots, it offers a vast space and unique history to host various socio-cultural activities.
Kai Schiemenz's spiraling architectonic sculpture consists of 3-parts, a staircase, a smal enclosed platform and tower. The structure rises up from the park’s lone hill, a mound of building foundations from before the Wall. If the sculpture truly has historical foundations, it appears like a blown-up scale-model of a collision between Constructivist forms and more recent Post-Structuralist mega-buildings where “form follows function” does not always preside. Its plywood and lattice structure rises intuitively from the ground. Viewers can ascend its stairs and into the empty platform. Similar to the artist's past work, the tower operates as both a monument standing alone in the park’s vast field and as a pavilion from which to view. It provides the practical purpose of seeing and of being seen. However, its form also suggests a utopian architecture which placed on the historical site of the former Berlin Wall defiantly takes a last stand before its surrounding area is at last absolved and run over by urban renewal. http://www.skulpturenpark.org/
photo from http://www.skulpturenpark.org/ 
photo from http://www.skulpturenpark.org/ 
after winter storm Erika
picture from http://www.skulpturenpark.org/
movie under http://www.architekturclips.de/holzturmend/holzturm.html
http://www.tagesspiegel.de/zeitung/Ticket;art2811,2488453
February 2, 2008. TAZ, Berlin. "Aus der Spirale heraus mit Blick f¸r das Bereichernde," by MJ. p. 25
Keine Kommentare:
Kommentar veröffentlichen