No Violence To The Sky

In his 1999 book “Observations for young architects”, César Pelli – architect of One Canada Square, the Petronas Twin Towers, and Manhattan’s downtown World Financial Center, amongst many others – openly and passionately discusses the complex relationship between buildings, their environment, the people in and around them, and the challenge of balancing all of these factors into a final design that do not cause a “violence to their place”. Inspired by the book, this projected video sculpture by artist Alex May presents the publicly viewable external architecture of One Canada Square not directly, but as it can be seen reflected in the buildings and environment that surround it; an indirect (and sometimes distorted to the point of abstraction) secondary architecture that is evolving over time as new buildings and features are built in its surrounding area.