The Magic Carpet

Pae White

Summary

The Magic Carpet installation by Pae White floats in the check-in hall at Berlin Brandenburg Airport and gives travelers a feeling of lightness and movement. The 1000 m² work of art consists of filigree aluminum strips and combines technical precision with artistic vision. The large red carpet takes up the motif of the flying carpet. It was created as part of the "Kunst am Bau" competition, which took place in 2010. The Magic Carpet was completed in spring 2012.

Services

Parametric planning, obtaining planning permission, production and assembly, installation

Project manager

Marcel Glapski & Peter Greskamp

Client

Berlin Brandenburg Airport (BER)

Year

2012

Floating between worlds - art in transit

Pae White was inspired by the idea of a flying carpet that blurs the boundaries between reality and fantasy. The artwork is intended to give travellers a feeling of lightness and movement and symbolize the dynamics of travel.

The installation consists of 486 aluminum frames, each 4 millimeters thick and 10 centimeters high. These boxes are connected to each other by joints and together form an area of 27 by 37 meters. The filling material consists of extremely thin aluminum strips with a thickness of only 0.3 millimeters. In total, the filling material would be around 13 kilometers long if it were unfolded. The entire work of art weighs 4.7 tons and is painted in traffic red, a color that is also used for traffic lights and road signs.

Metal becomes magic - a staging of 12 km of aluminum

The installation is suspended from 97 steel cables at a height of around 8 meters in the BER check-in hall. Of these, 67 cables are statically load-bearing, while the remaining 25 cables were installed to meet fire protection requirements. During the day, the frame elements, including the fillings, were manufactured in a workshop specially set up in the check-in hall. During the night, the frames were installed by industrial climbers. The entire production and assembly period took around 3 months.

The cleaning of the almost 1000 square meter work of art takes place annually and extends over several nights, with special work platforms and gentle cleaning methods being used to avoid damaging the sensitive aluminium strips. The planning and implementation of the project took several years. Following the "Art in Construction" competition in 2010, the installation was completed in spring 2012 and installed in Terminal 1 of BER.

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