For Sebastian Weiss, it’s not the popularity of a building or the architect’s name that lures him in. ‘It could also be a completely trivial building, like a supermarket or parking garage that has a charisma.’ In November 2019, spurred on by the release of ‘Ricardo Bofill: Visions of Architecture’, Weiss visited one of the architect's most notable feats, ‘La Muralla Roja’ designed in 1968 and located in Calp, Spain.
Lodging in the fully-functioning apartment complex for a week, he documented the strict, alternating geometry, surreal colour schemes and sci-fi-esque shadow plays. Here, Weiss offers a window into the otherworldly realm of ‘The Red Wall’. As a tribute to the legendary Spanish architect, who passed away on 14 January 2022, we revisit Weiss’ experience of creating the iconic series.
Sebastian Weiss on photographing Ricardo Bofill’s La Muralla Roja
The sun was already low in the sky, casting the entire series in a warm autumnal tone. Long shadows intensified the impression of the strict architecture and add more plasticity to the images
The photographic encounter with a building feels to me like a meeting with a strange or unknown person, there is curiosity and tension, but also respect and restraint
This architectural utopia was really a major event for me as a photographer because it is such an absurdly beautiful and surreal location, which appears sometimes like a film set or a staging
INFORMATION
-
Clocking on: the bedside analogue timepieces that won’t alarm your aestheticWe track down the only tick-tocks that matter, nine traditional alarm clocks that tell the time with minimum fuss and maximum visual impact
-
Architecture, sculpture and materials: female Lithuanian artists are celebrated in NîmesThe Carré d'Art in Nîmes, France, spotlights the work of Aleksandra Kasuba and Marija Olšauskaitė, as part of a nationwide celebration of Lithuanian culture
-
‘There is more work to be done in the garden’: Dries Van Noten on deciding to grow his burgeoning beauty lineFor Dries Van Noten, 2024 has been a landmark year. After stepping down from fashion in June, the designer speaks to Wallpaper* about a new focus on nurturing the brand’s beauty line and spending more time in his beloved garden
-
Mona Kuhn’s love affair with Rudolph Schindler’s modernist LA home‘The Schindler House: A Love Affair’ features artist Mona Kuhn’s surreal-inspired silver prints evoking an impossible love
-
Yoshitomo Nara’s skittish universe takes over the Guggenheim Bilbao Museum‘Yoshitomo Nara’ at the Guggenheim Bilbao Museum is the first major European retrospective to explore four decades of the Japanese artist’s oeuvre
-
Suburbia: American dream or residential nightmare, asks multidisciplinary show‘Suburbia. Building the American Dream’ digs deep into the archetypes, rise and realities of suburban living, at Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona
-
Ibiza is the new hotspot for contemporary artGathering Ibiza opens, a Balearic outpost of the London gallery, as founder Alex Flick hails the island’s emerging contemporary art scene
-
Helmut Newton’s life and work to be celebrated in a major exhibition in A Coruña, Spain‘Helmut Newton - Fact & Fiction’, created with the Helmut Newton Foundation, will open at the Marta Ortega Pérez (MOP) Foundation in November 2023
-
Inside Ricardo Bofill’s Walden 7, a cathedral of postmodern curiosityA new series by architectural photographer Sebastian Weiss takes us on a tour of Walden 7, Ricardo Bofill’s majestic Catelonian apartment building – a cathedral of utopian curiosity and community
-
Heaven on Earth: architect Toshiko Mori curates Candida Höfer’s sublime new photography showAt Sean Kelly, New York, architect Toshiko Mori is curating a new show by Candida Höfer, spanning a 30-year period of the German photographer’s spatially sublime work
-
10 Wallpaper* photography moments of 2022, from piña coladas to Pipilotti RistThe most memorable Wallpaper* photography moments of 2022, courtesy of our esteemed photo desk
