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High Tech Goes Natural: Calatrava's New Euro-Architecture
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11800 |
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Section : |
THE ARTS
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| Issue
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1 / 1994 |
1,789 Words |
| Author
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Thomas D. Sullivan
Thomas D. Sullivan is architecture critic for the Washington
Times. |
Santiago Calatrava is one of the most remarkable and promising architects of our time. At forty-two, he has won renown as both an architect and an engineer for his buildings and bridges, which mix high technology with forms influenced by shapes in nature--trees, birds, and even a charging bull.
Born in Valencia, Spain, Calatrava studied art and earned a B.A. in architecture and a Ph.D. in engineering. He has quickly earned a name for himself in a field where fame usually comes--if at all--rather late in life. Working from offices in Zurich and Paris, Calatrava has designed major structures built or now under construction in Spain, France, Germany, and Switzerland. His work has garnered attention in the United States as well, reflected in the exhibit Santiago Calatrava: Structure and Expression last year at the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) in New York and a new book, Santiago Calatrava: Bridges.
The architecture of Santiago Calatrava shows a strong sense of proportion as well as a sculptural sense. The parabolic arches of his Bach de Roda-Felipe II Bridge in Barcelona show that its designer has an eye for proportion like an ear with perfect pitch. Calatrava has a penchant for dramatic gestures, too: His Alamillo Bridge, built for the 1992 World's Fair in Seville, is shaped like a harp and is held up by a pylon that rises 466 feet in the air.
Euro-centered Work
All of Calatrava's structures are in Europe (he has won a competition to complete the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine in New York, but it is not yet certain whether his design will be built). His work is significant because it is a serious offering in an age of much architectural frivolity. While it is unlikely that he would start a new movement in architecture--his oeuvre is too idiosyncratic to imitate successfully--he takes the art of building in an original direction.
Calatrava is something of a show-off--but, then, he has something to show. And while the quality of his designs is sometimes undercut by a tendency to be showy, he has proven that he can temper his approach to the task at hand. Three railroad stations prove this. Calatrava speaks of railroad stations as important places in the life of cities. At the opening of the MOMA show, he said, "All cities would [be] poorer if all stations became just places which you go there and take a train and disappear somewhere. They are the doors of our cities." For Calatrava, railroad stations are crucial to understanding a city
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