SCI-Arc is pleased to present Hypostyle, a site-specific SCI-Arc Gallery installation by architect Henry N. Cobb. Since time immemorial, hypostyles have been constructed as halls wherein highly ordered arrays of vertical supports populate roofed spaces that are conceptually limitless—but to widely varying effect. In the Great Hall of the Temple of Ammon at Karnak (1408-c.1300 B.C.), massive columns take preemptive pride of place within a space that is consequently experienced as entirely residual. By contrast, in the Great Mosque at Cordova (786-c.1000 A.D.), tiered arches supported by relatively slender columns grant primacy to a lofty space ennobled by their intricately contrived celebratory presence. More ambiguously, in the Basilica Cistern at Istanbul (532 A.D.), space and structure achieve an uncanny balance that stirs both wonder and apprehension. And in the Grain Storage Warehouse at Altdorf (1912 A.D.), the flared heads of Robert Maillart’s octagonal columns induce an altogether thrilling sense that the space has been created by compressing what had once been a solid block of concrete into a forest of slender vertical supports.

The hypostyle in this SCI-Arc Gallery installation is an experiment. Far from being intended to demonstrate or test a general theory, its purpose is simply to discover the experiential consequence of populating a hypostyle not with columnar solids but with planar elements joined to form vertical constructs that shape figural spaces both within and between them. Each of the twenty constructs comprising the installation is composed of four 3-foot by 8-foot 1-3/4-inch thick hollow-core doors: three joined to form an H-shaped vertical that is then capped by a fourth roofing the space below. Rotation of the constructs in alternating rows sequentially in both directions introduces a larger-scale order, further enhancing a complex interplay that blurs the distinction between solid and void, open and closed. One construct in the center row is omitted to create a gathering space within an otherwise uninterrupted array. A hypostyle thus constituted is without precedent, and its effect on the occupant cannot be fully predicted by drawings: it must be experienced.

Read more on the exhibition page at http://bit.ly/1wEvmQ9.