TOWERS AND SKYCRAPERS, now in CaixaForum Madrid
09/10/2012.
Caixa Forum [MAD] Spain 10/10/2012 > 5/01/2013
metalocus, LUIS DE GREGORIO
metalocus, LUIS DE GREGORIO
A few months ago we announced here this exhibition in the Caixa Forum in Barcelona. Now, after three months in this city, "Torres and skyscrapers. From Babel to Dubai" arrives to Madrid.
Winds, 2010. Collage, by Du Zhenjun. Courtesy of CaixaForum Madrid.
Oldeurope, 2010. Fotomontaje, por Du Zhenjun. Cortesía de CaixaForum Barcelona.
Worker on the scaffolding of the Boerentoren, Antwerp. Photography, 1929-1930. Courtesy of CaixaForum Barcelona.
World Trade Center (1966-1973), New York. Photography. Courtesy of CaixaForum Barcelona.
Anonymous. Comparative chart of the height of the great monuments of the world, 1889. Engraving. Particular collection. © Photo: RMN / Agence Bulloz
Photography of the exhibition. Courtesy of CaixaForum Barcelona. The spring of skyscrapers, 1885-1919. The disaster of the great fire of Chicago, occurred in 1871, favored the construction of skyscrapers, and the one that is commonly recognized as the first in architectural history is the Home Insurance Building (42 meters, 10 floors), built in Chicago in 1885- 1886 by William Le Baron Jenney.
Headquarters of Caixa Forum in the Paseo del Prado in Madrid.
Humanity has long felt driven to build ever upwards, to conquer the sky. The desire to erect constructions that are visible from afar, that act as symbols of prosperity, progress, development and power, is implicit in the very idea of architecture.
The exhibition offers a journey through the history of the construction of towers and skyscrapers, based on the myth of the Tower of Babel, a construction that defied the laws of nature and the divine power and was a source of inspiration for European painters of the thirteenth century to XIX, to skyscrapers designed in the XXI century.
OPEN LECTURE
Tuesday October 9 from 7.00 p.m.
The irresistible fascination of the towers and skyscrapers
Leaded by Robert Dulau and Pascal Mory, curators.
Venue.- CaixaForum Madrid. Paseo del Prado, 36. Madrid.
Date.- from Octuber 10 to January 5 of 2013.
Since the creation of the myth of the Tower of Babel to the appearance of the first skycraper in 1850 in the United States, the model has been reproduced regularly in the world between the ages XX and XXI. The towers reflect one of the most important aspects of modernity and are essential references in terms of urban planning. The skyscraper is one of the modern icons, and its image of the skycraper has become an ineresting response to the lack of space not only in big cities of the West, but anywhere in the world.
The adoption of new and more sophisticated technology opens a new research area for renewal and the answer to new problems and complex sensibilities. Height, technology, sustainability, creativity and emblematic character, function, and aesthetic impact are basic questions and filled today.
This exhibition curated by Robert Dulau and Pascal Mory, aspires to explore, by paintings, engravings, drawings, models, photographs and films, the diversity of architectures that over time have shown a search of the inaccessible, for his excesses and his desire to overcome any material limit.
