WHISPERING ICONOGRAPHY
While new developing cities obsess with architectural icons that yell its iconic qualities, an architectural piece by Giancarlo Mazzanti modestly announces itself in the landscape of Santo Domingo, Colombia. Biblioteca Parque Espana is a library overlooking the city. The icon is not imposing and melds with the surrounding foliage, as if rocks sitting on top of the hill. This iconography resembles Jean Nouvel’s Proposed Tower in Spain, combined with the grouping of sail-like silhouettes of Utzon’s Sydney Opera House. Although Nouvel’s tower and this library are both abstraction of a rock formation, Mazzanti’s building evokes softness. From afar, the building looks solid but inside, the volume is actually expressed as another skin. Window placements are abstractly placed to glisten at night and resemble like rock stains. What is striking about this library is its understated presence, yet still leaving us a strong recall. Its high elevation makes it visible from all sides, blending harmoniously with the landscape.
C R E D I T S :
Biblioteca Parque Espana
All Photos by Sergio Gomez
