Radicepura Garden Festival 2017, Giarre, Sicily, Italy (Awarded, Constructed- Exhibition duration: 21 April 2017- 2018)
Artun Agbulut, Hande Kalender, Melis Yüksel, Murat Usta, Sabahattin Sakallı, Yağmur Yenice
Offical Link: Passage to Mediterranean
In this project, we are focused on the relationship between humans and nature in the Mediterranean Landscape. The creation of an enclosed space allows visitors to experience different phases of interaction with nature. The box itself although rigid and solid until a person intervenes and changes the form of the vertical surface.
User experience
As visitors walk through this passage, they are isolated from the nature surrounding them and find themselves in an artificial space. When an explorer creates a rift on the surface he/she finds a specific Mediterranean plant behind it. With all explorers playing with the rope surfaces in different ways, the structure becomes interactive and dynamic. As they walk to the center, they find the other explorers coming from the other end of the passage. At this point, the project questions human-human relationships by connecting them in an artificial Mediterranean central garden.
Form and structure
The form of the structure reflects the identity of the Mediterranean streetscape which has narrow and labyrinth-like. We are inspired by this Mediterranean experience and wanted to reflect it by framing natural elements on both edges and also by preparing surprises with the elasticity of the vertical rope surfaces. At night with glowing rope surfaces, it becomes a strong and silent background for the flora next to it and it empowers the perception of the Mediterranean flora.