Chilean studio Pezo von Ellrichshausen has erected a temporary wooden tower of “an ambiguous” scale in the Jardin des Tuileries in Paris. Named the “Deci Pavilion,” the structure is made up of ten stacked octagonal wooden drums of decreasing size. While in reality only large enough to hold one visitor at a time, the column’s form and relationship to its surroundings give it the presence of a much larger structure.
“This column, a hollowed octagonal shaft that decreases its size upon ascension, embodies an ambiguous scale, resonating with historic landmarks while distorting the perspective of the most monumental axis in Paris. As a temporary wooden monolith, the object has a familiar yet remote presence,” explain the architects.
Following both gravitational logic and the “ancient and arbitrary rule of ‘entasis’,” the tower’s design draws from many historical tower archetypes, such as “a babel barbican, a ziggurat, a lighthouse, an epic pedestal or an obsolete telescopic observatory.”
Small rectangular opening puncture each surface of the faceted drums, contributing to the distortion of scale. Since the openings remain the same size while the drums diminish, the tower’s height is fixed at the point where an additional drum’s surface area could no longer contain the stipulated openings.
Inside the structure, the allotted space is just large enough to hold a single person, forcing the individual to become a part of the column, and enticing the tenant to look upward through the final drum’s octagonal opening to the sky.
“Technically, this little tower might be read as a tenth of another building. Literally, the name of the construction is given both by that conventional proportion to reality but also by its amount of levels, by its ten octagonal drums.”
“Deci Pavilion” can be viewed as an extension of Pezo von Ellrichshausen’s study into the creation of architecture through the setting of internal mathematical rules, as seen in projects like the Vara Pavilion at the 2016 Venice Biennale, created through the overlapping of 10 cylindrical forms; Casa Mila, consisting of 10 adjacent square rooms; and their “Finite Format” exhibition, which contained a room-sized model of 100 interlocking circles.
Pezo von Ellrichshausen designed the pavilion for the 2016 edition of the annual International Contemporary Art Fair (FIAC), which has invited architects such as Kengo Kuma and Sou Fujimoto to create temporary structures in the Jardin des Tuileries.
News via Pezo von Ellrichshausen.
Credits
Client: Foire Internationale d’Art Contemporain (FIAC 2016)
Author: Pezo von Ellrichshausen (Mauricio Pezo & Sofia von Ellrichshausen)
Collaborators: Diego Perez, Victoria Bodevin, Findlay Barge, Iven Peh, Sarah Biffa, Anton zu Knyphausen, Daniel Andersson, Teresa Correia
Production: Solo Galerie, Paris (Christian Bourdais & Eva Albarran)
Construction: Pezo von Ellrichshausen
Materials: Tinted pine wood
Dimensions: 120x120x730cm
Date: 2016
Photography: © Pezo von Ellrichshausen
