Lichtbögen
Arcs of Light
Arcs de lumière
Tour Exaltis is a relatively late addition to La Défense (2006), designed by
architects Bruno Willerval of Bridot-Willerval and Bernardo
Fort-Brescia of Architectonica, and built by
Bouygues. It houses the headquarters of Mazars.
The arcs of light are
lighting strips in the interior of the big entrance hall. The architects have
extended them onto the pavement outside the building, as you can see in this
image (click to enlarge).
I have taken up that idea and “extended” the arcs of light into the
surroundings, structuring the mirror images of la Défense, and blurring the
distinction “inside – outside”.
The first image is closely cropped to the pedestrian level of La Défense, with Tour Total and Tour Areva framing the image left and right. The second shows the lower street level - with pedestrians, and the photographer in the lower left corner. (Contrary to Erich Kästner's proverbial saying that the photographer is never in the picture: "Merk's dir, du Schaf, weil's immer gilt: der Photograph ist nie auf'm Bild.")
Here we have two emblematic buildings of La Défense reflected in cascades in
the concave structure of Tour Exaltis: La Grande Arche and one of the towers of
Société Générale.
"Breaking
through"
The reflected image of Pei's EDF tower seems to be breaking through the façade
of the Exaltis tower from the inside.