C A C | Valencia

Ciutat de les Arts I Les Ciències is the Valencian spelling. In Valencia you always find at least two spellings of Spanish. Catalan and Valencian.

If the Steven Spielberg movie JAWS was a building...

I drove to Valencia from Vila Joiosa. I´m in the Costa Blanca area to work, but decided to travel out from Cph a little earlier and see some friends on this coast so I flew in to Alicante. I wanted to go to the Arts&Science city in Valencia. It´s important to remember it is a city. Not one building. Not just ONE landmark, but many. I know just a little. I have read and seen the photos of this gigantic space designed and sculpted by the Valencia born Santiago Calatrava and the Oceanographic park is created by Felix Candela. The Oceanographic park I will look more closely at next time. This Valencia trip I dedicated to seeing the paramount sculpture city park that Calatrava has created. I was not ready. I had not grasped how enormous it is. At this cultural&scientific center that holds several museums, opera house, theatre, exhibition areas, restaurants, shops and attractions on a 350 000 sqm area. It is overwhelming. I saw the architecture as sculptures. From tiny to enormous. I could not stop staring. I stared and took photos and felt good. This was a big experience for me. When I saw the Guggenheim in New York,  the Sidney Opera House and the Sagrada Família  was a similar feeling. But....this space/place/landmark is not just one building it´s a whole city of sculptural architecture. If I was a choreographer I would like to create a piece that dances in the shallow pools of water and that moves down the dramatic stairs. If I was an actor/singer I would crave to be in a musical, opera or play that opens in this theater. If I was a director I would plan to make both movie and TV series here - a documentary (hopefully one has already been done and I do not know about it)  has to be made of this cultural, scientific & historic sculptural monument that we luckily can abbreviate to CAC. 

Enjoy!

-I sure did

/Jimmy 

The structure of the buildings are as much the sculpture.

If you have seen Calatrava´s brigde in Buenos Aires than you smile when you see this harp shape.Here you see my blog post from when I saw the Puenta De la Mujer bridge in Bu Ai. 

I can not wait until the greens have taken over this part. It is along tunnel in which I could not be it, but it holds a garden and spaces that I see filled with cultural events. This is hard to grasp from looking at his picture but the highest point in this structure must be over 15 meters high.

Here you almost grasp the enormity of this place.

The pools of water on mosaics is like a sea surrounding CAC.

I think of Gaudi when I see these structural beams.

The beauty of this huge sculpture. If you look at it like I do, it is the largest sculpture in the world.

This is a exhibition by Heinz Mack called www.ninecolumns.com

Think of making an exhibition of water plants in all of these pools.

A playful attitude to art&sciens is applied all over.

Go and see and experience CAC in Valencia, Spain. NOW!

You see Calatrava can not have someone else putting in a bench in his sculpture. He makes a bench like one you never seen before. Just like his vision of a city that we never before have visited. Thank you for sharing your inner city of CAC.