A New Odyssey: Architecture in the Space and Homer

Sept. 2, 2011 - PRLog -- SEPTEMBER 2, 2011 - NEW YORK - Emanuel Dimas de Melo Pimenta (www.emanuelpimenta.net), the Brazilian architect and urban planner who coined the concept of "virtual architecture" in the early 1980s, is launching a new architectural design: an orbital building around Earth. Pimenta says, "Until now, we have had no example of true architecture in space. Building related to satellites or space stations has been focused on tubular systems - a heritage from missile design."

Pimenta's project, an observatory of planet Earth open to civil society, which can also work as a new kind of hotel - has an enigmatic title: Kairos. He explains, "Kairos was one of the terms to mean 'time' in ancient Greece, but contrarily to chronos, the word kairos means 'a global view of time,' a holistic approach to a large historical period."

Pimenta's building is totally tensioned. Made of flexible antiballistic fabrics with internal movable walls, it is completely deprogrammable. "We could call it a water-building because all walls are filled with water," he explains. "It is completely deprogrammable, which means that the original program, the functions of each internal space, can be easily and quickly changed at low cost."

Pimenta notes that Kairos is also a celebration of the 50 years of Yuri Gagarin's orbital flight in 1961. Like other of his architectural designs, Pimenta proposes the building as an artwork. "It is an architectural design, a challenge in technological terms, everything surprisingly possible, a conceptual artwork, but also a series of drawings, digital images, a movie and a book," he says. Contrary to space history until now, he says, "Kairos is a project open to the civil society, a new approach to architecture, a questioning about a new civilizational leap in a world where human expansion is no longer possible - a manifest against war, a protest for peace and for human collaboration."

Kairos will be exhibited around the world. On September 10, 2011, Italy's Holotopia Academy, located in the place Ulysses met the Sirens in the Odyssey, will showcase the exhibit. "That location connects thousands of years of humanity, and has a strong symbolic character," Pimenta says.

Then, Kairos will be launched in September 2011 at New York's Streaming Museum (www.streamingmuseum.org), then move to Lisbon's Robotarium (www.robotarium.pt/intro_en.html) in October, and continue on a year-long tour through its global network of screens in public spaces. In November, the book, "Kairos: A Bird Orbiting Planet Earth," will be launched at Amazon.com.

For more information, please visit http://www.emanuelpimenta.net. For an interview, contact Emanuel Pimenta by phone at +41 91 7913911 or +351 91 9802813 or by email: luciana@asa-art.com

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Emanuel Dimas de Melo Pimenta, the Brazilian architect and urban planner who coined the concept of "virtual architecture" in the early 1980s, is launching a new architectural design: an orbital building around Earth.