by Sandro Marpillero
James Carpenter's works are an unusual combination of architecture and art. Its glass facades – for the German Foreign Office in Berlin, among others – play with light, reflection and refraction. They direct our gaze outwards or create changing impressions for passers-by depending on the position of the sun. Carpenter has also created short films and video installations, dealing primarily with themes of ecology. He is responsible for the facade of World Trade Center 7, the first skyscraper to be completed at Ground Zero in New York in October 2005. Other works include the Moiré Stair Tower in the Post Tower in Bonn, the Tulane University Student Center in New Orleans, and the Dichroic Light Field, an installation on a high-rise building on Columbus Avenue in New York. Sandro Marpillero, born in Italy in 1955, is an architect and writes regularly for the architecture magazines A+U, Casabella, Rassegna and Lotus International. He teaches as an associate professor at Columbia University in New York.
