Written for The Brag, 13 December, 2010.
Despite dealing with a freezing French morning and dodgy Skype connection, Alan Parkinson has an amazingly spirited phone voice. What else would you expect from a guy who’s spent the past 20 years carving fantasies out of air and light?
Alan is the creative director of Architects of Air (AoA), a Nottingham-based company that build ‘luminaria’: large-scale inflatable PVC structures that take six months to complete, last for 300 exhibition days and have visited over 30 countries since 1992. For Alan, who fell in love with the plastic medium back in the 80’s, luminaria are all about deception and inspiration.
AoA’s latest construction, Mirazozo, is taking over the Sydney Opera House Forecourt this January, with a 1200m² maze of vinyl walkways and mosque-inspired domes. “The idea is not to make something big but to make something that is big enough for someone to lose themselves in as they wander around corridors and come across spaces that make them lift their head and think wow,” explains Alan.
With its Pop Art edge, neon seams and natural light displays, Mirazozu reflects Alan’s design touchstones: Archimedean solids, Gothic cathedrals, Gaudi and Islamic architecture. “There is a purity in the architecture,” he explains after a thought-collecting pause. “When you’re going around mosques and bazaars in the Islamic world you see they’re integrated into a seamless whole. You’re wandering around all these paths, craftsmen and carpet sellers and then there’s another archway and you walk into a mosque and it belongs to the same architecture and the same aesthetic. I like that experience of being in a very integrated architectural environment.” It’s really not surprising that he’s itching to take his structures to Iran and Syria.
Although Alan has never been one to condition his visitor’s expectations, he cautiously admits that Mirazozo has a purpose. “I built this structure to create a sense of wonder because it frames the phenomenon of light. For most people there is always a certain wow factor because they find the intensity of luminosity quite surprising. If they link that wow factor to a certain sense of wonder then that would be the structure fulfilling itself.”
Still, Alan’s a sucker for a truly moving response like the one that sprung from a sculptor visiting an AoA instillation at Prague Castle. “He said the space was ‘somewhere between a womb and a cathedral’ and I really think it is,” explains Alan in a suddenly mellow voice. “It’s simultaneously very, very confronting but can also be inspiring and that’s the definition I’ve held onto ever since.” With that Alan’s need for caffeine kicks in and he departs to think up gravity-resisting pod designs and prepare for a Sydney summer.
What: Architects of Air – Mirazozo
When: January 3-27, 2011
Where: Sydney Opera House Forecourt
Tickets: sydneyoperahouse.com / 9250 7777
Interesting to hear it from the man himself. Thanks! Mirazozo is doing great business at the Sydney Opera House, despite competition from that great monument.
http://richardtulloch.wordpress.com/2011/01/24/sydney-festival-mirazozo-inflated-expectations/