With an intention to attract and impress viewers with his massive scale, He has been selected as winner of the 2013 Young Architects Program (YAP) MAXXI in Rome, an annual competition that promotes and supports young and emerging architects in collaboration with MAXXI Architettura, MoMA/MoMA PS1 of New York, Constructo of Santiago and, for the first time, Istanbul Modern, Turkey.
Turin-based studio bam! bottega di architettura sostenibile, designed He as a grandiose and buoyant installation that transforms the concrete MAXXI facade and expansive piazza into a visual spectacular, while offering a shady escape from the Summer heat.
Opening in June, the helium-filled balloon will rise above the piazza casting a mesmerizing, yellow shadow on the grass and a surrounding wooden platform, forming a structureless place for rest, recreation and relaxation. During the day, water will drip from the translucent aerostatic prism, ideally delimiting the space beneath the volume and creating a refreshing curtain for the public. As night falls, the water will be replaced by light, lifting the plastic aerostat up to the height of the museum and transforming it into a lantern suspended in the sky.
Large dimensions and lightness, innovation and flexibility, transparency and sustainability are the key features of He which, at the end of the summer, will be deflated with the helium being recovered for use in scientific and medical research.
"I believe that this year's YAP MAXXI winning project's strength lies in a well-judged synthesis of poetry and technology," stated director of MAXXI Architettura Margherita Guccione. "bam! studio's project perfectly encapsulates the three essential qualities of the YAP program," stated senior curator Pippo Ciorra. "The valorization of the public space in an unusual and sustainable fashion, as is the case at the other sites around the world, the tackling of the museum architecture "head on" and the courageous exploration of the crucial theme of powerful yet construction-free architecture."
He will be inaugurated in Rome on the same day as CODA’s Party Wall in New York on June 20, 2013.
Project Title: He, SensitiveSize
Architect: bam! bottega di architettura sostenibile
Team Members: Alberto Bottero; Valeria Bruni, Simona Della Rocca, Fabio Vignolo
Plastic by: FaberSum, Torino (Andrea Patrucco, Enrico Ferro)
Compare He to UNIRE/UNITE - last year’s winning design from YAP MAXXI.
