| Architect |
Santiago
Calatrava |
| Date Built |
1998 |
| Location |
City of
Arts and Sciences |
| Description |
|
|
In 1992 Santiago Calatrava received a
commission to develop a 35 hectare site on
the dry bed of the River Turia in
Valencia. The local government
wanted to establish this site between the
city centre and the sea as home to an
opera house, science museum and a
planetarium. The whole complex is known as
the Ciutat de les Arts I les Ciencies or
City of Arts and Sciences. The first building to be completed was L'Hemisfèric opening its doors for the first time in 1998. This spectacular building sits within a shallow pool that reflects its 100 metre long ovoid roof.  Inside it houses a large sphere within which is the projection room. The building was intended to resemble a human eye symbolising, as its website says, "... the observation of the world that visitors discover by means of surprising audiovisual projections. .... The Hemisfèric has the most advanced system of full-dome digital projection to allow the viewer to penetrate the world of astronomy and digital animation. With this projection system the Hemisfèric can feature activities related to astronomy and the cosmos and put on shows on other varied themes as “A walk around the solar system” and “Our home in the cosmos”, both in accordance with the different educational levels. The images cover the whole screen because they use a projection system made up of six Barco Galaxy projectors of 12,000 ANSI lumens each distributed on the perimeter of the screen; a Zeiss PowerDome graphic generator that allows the generation of digital content; and a Uniview display platform and astronomical simulator that reproduces the whole universe, as it has an extensive three-dimension astronomy database including NASA models and a wide range of stars."    |
|
|
L'Hemisfèric,
Valencia, Spain
 |
