Nanning City Gateway
Nanning, China
Nanning Administration Bureau of Planning
Project 2000 – 2002
The Nanning Gateway is a strong statement for visitors travelling into the city from the airport.
Viewed while pulling away from tollgates, the design presents a pair of monumental sculptural flowers flanking the freeway.
Proceeding along the route one of the flowers deconstructs into a series of petals projecting from the embankment to the right. It is revealed to be an optical illusion, an assembly formed from the precise visual alignment of separate elements spread over several hundred metres.
This transformation of static sculptures changes the gateway into a dynamic space / time experience, exploiting the unique opportunities available to the moving observer. This approach is quite different from what would apply to a static installation. Each petal is nonetheless an individual sculpture in its own right, constructed from coloured, perforated metal panels so that it is partially transparent and creates a sense of movement from the moire patterns formed by the perforations.
