All language subtitles for The.Art.of.Architecture.S01E01.Episode.1.1080p.AMZN.WEB-DL.DDP2.0.H.264-TEPES

Narrator: Santiago Calatrava
is the 21st century

equivalent of 'Renaissance Man'.

Artist and sculptor,
engineer and architect,

his stellar career
has been influenced by everyone

from Michelangelo to Giacometti.

[soft piano music]

He's given us a world full
of spectacular bridges,

airports, railway stations,
and other public buildings.

All instantly identifiable

by their white fins wrapped
around sinuous shapes.

In his late 60s,
he shows no signs of retiring.

Rushing round the world in
search of the next commission,

the next architecture
competition.

Though he was born in Spain,

Calatrava has long lived
in Switzerland,

this ordered and efficient
country

a perfect match for his gentle,

thoughtful and considered
approach to life and design.

Before that, he and his family
lived in New York.

And it's in Manhattan that
his practice has just completed

the project which may have
moved him more than any other.

A transportation hub
for the New York

and New Jersey Port Authority
at the World Trade Center,

where the Twin Towers
were destroyed by terrorists

on 11 September 2001.

And where the victims included
staff

of the Port Authority itself.

- The building there
has to be exceptional.

It's not like doing another
station in a wonderful city

like New York,
which it is already exceptional.

But it is a station
for Ground Zero.

And this...let's say oriented
from the day one

the conception of the design.

[soft piano music]

Narrator: For commuters using
the Port Authority

Trans-Hudson trains,

the World Trade Center
Transportation Hub

delivers them
to Lower Manhattan.

It surfaces near the memorial
to those who died in 2001.

And in the shadow of the towers

that were part
of the master plan

by the American-Polish
architect Daniel Libeskind,

the man who said,

"Cities are the greatest
creations of humanity."

In his original scheme
the train station

was to have been part
of one of those towers.

But Santiago Calatrava
and the Port Authority

felt it deserved greater
prominence

in a space of its own.

- My idea was, first of all,
making an autonomous building.

And second...

..landmarking also
this particular corner in a way

or knowledgeable that the scale
of the skyscrapers

conceived at the time, you know,

in the master plan
of Daniel Libeskind.

Was...

..so to restore the idea
of the skyline.

But looking it from Brooklyn,
do you understand?

So, the wonderful view
of the Twin Towers, you know,

traversing, that image was
really an astounding view.

Lower Manhattan, the skyline,
and then the Twin Towers

substitute in the original plan
of Daniel Libeskind.

Very sensible, you know,
in a kind of harmonious

growing buildings towards
the freedoms tower.

So, I thought that this - very
well thought and very well done.

But is part of the skyline
of New York,

which it is a piece of art
by itself.

[orchestral music]

Then I thought,
when I am a person, you know,

working in the area,
working in the garden.

I need elements related
to my scale,

who link my scale to the scale
of the skyscrapers,

and humanise,

humanise, so the scale
of the skyscraper.

So I was I feel very comfortable
with the scale of it.

I never thought
the building is small.

No, the building is appropriate,

because is delivering you
a...a scale in between yourself

and the gigantic scale of the...

..of the neighbouring building.

[orchestral music]

Narrator: For Calatrava,
the World Trade Center site

presented an opportunity not
only to remember the victims

of 9/11 but also to revitalise
the public realm.

Like much of America,

the infrastructure of New York
has been neglected.

The age of publicly funding
great buildings

and public spaces
has long passed.

Worse, some of the most iconic
have been demolished.

Pennsylvania Station
went in 1963 -

"incomprehensible"
Calatrava calls it.

Grand Central,
now heroically restored,

came close to being
lost in the 1970s.

Where was his inspiration?

In the most famous squares
of Europe.

The Piazza Navona in Rome,
Salamanca's Plaza Mayor,

Piazza san Marco in Venice,

which Napoleon called
'the drawing room of Europe.'

Calatrava wanted to bring some
of that spirit to Manhattan,

to make the Transportation Hub
and its surrounding square

a place people would not only
pass through but also enjoy.

He was motivated, too,

by the spiritual power
of architecture.

He believes in the ability
of buildings to move people

and not just churches.

He admires Grand Central Station
and its main hall.

Why shouldn't those on the daily
commute into New York

be given a structure
which would uplift them.

- I was also upset of the idea
of learning from New York.

From the existing civic
monuments and from the sense

extraordinary sense of community
that the American society has.

That we Europeans
has lost a little bit

through the social system,

because the state is providing
us, you know, a lot of things,

and this doesn't...doesn't exist
so much in the United States.

And...and...and what you have,
it is a lot of social effort

coming from the communitarian
effort,

from the sense of community
from the people.

So, I was fascinated
from these ideas,

and so finally for me,

the inspiration or the example
was in Grand Central.

I wanted to recreate a space

who can be at the end of
the...I mean, in the 21 century,

compatible to the effort
done one...100 years

before building Grand Central.

And doing this extraordinary
space, that even today,

100 years later is completely
functional, completely working,

even, you know, they preserve
a lot of things,

people are
buying tickets in another way.

But they still, you know,

they are giving something
in the centre.

It is the time. You know,
[laughs] the hour.

Everybody can see
this fantastic, [laughs]

clock and so I mean, this I
think is really extraordinary.

Even I have also to say that
I...I knew the space before,

the space has been restored
with a lot of sensibilities.

Indeed, and the...the idea
of reproducing

or creating a symmetric space
by doing a new stairs.

And so, was very well done,
very well done,

and so also our space
is symmetric.

Isn't it, on one end
and the other.

Symmetric also on both sides

and so it has a lot of very
clear references,

being in a completely
different language.

But [stutters] I mean,

this, what, er, at the time they
try to do with stone and brass

and bronze and all of that.

We have done that with glass,
steel, marble and light.

Also like light like they have
been using.

We are also using light.

Narrator: But this was just
the beginning.

From a sketch on paper
to completion,

would take 15 years
of Santiago Calatrava's life

and become,
in his own words,

one of the most complex sites
in the world.

[soft music]

Narrator: Santiago Calatrava
was born in Valencia.

He studied architecture,
then aged 22,

moved to Zurich
to study civil engineering.

He opened his practice in 1981
and he is here still,

rising at 5.45am every morning,

running by the lake before
breakfast

and then spending three hours
painting and drawing.

[soft music]

- I think it is a great thing

when an architect can draw

freehand and draw beautifully.

Not every architect can,

and of course,

you can do things with models,
you can do it with CAD.

But the actual ability to draw
and conceive things,

and do details and test
them out, you know, freehand.

I think is a wonderful talent.

And it's wonderful
for the client, too,

to actually have the architect
sitting there

in front of you and drawing it
out, as you are speaking.

And Calatrava has the...this,
and he loves drawing.

And of course,
it's wonderful to see, you know,

the forms taking shape on paper.

Which otherwise,
an architect can explain to you

but it's nothing like seeing
it on paper.

And when done in a beautiful
freehand as he can do it.

[uplifting music]

Narrator:
At his office in the city centre

he's surrounded by young
architects proud to be working

for one of the architecture
world's most iconic figures.

And model makers whose task
is to realise, in 3D,

maquettes of Calatrava's
designs.

Here, in miniature,
are reminders of the shapes

that have made Calatrava famous
world wide.

[uplifting music]

- When it comes to bridges,
one of his great inspirations

was the Swiss engineer
Robert Maillart.

And he was a...an early
minimalist

that he really did push
the boundaries.

That he, he stripped down
the basic elements

you know, the arch, the deck,
to the absolute minimum.

And of course they make these
very graceful structures,

you know,
spanning mountain gorges

and actually touching
the ground and the air lightly.

And that is something
I think Calatrava inherited.

Of course some of his
architecture is quite beefy

and strong, and er, you know,
has a lot of mass to it.

But equally that grace
and lightness undoubtedly

I think comes or was inspired
by Maillart.

Most adventurous bridges today

are built by a combination
of architect and engineer.

But that's what's incredible
about Santiago,

is that he is trained
as engineer and architect

so he combines these skills,
in one person.

He's taking modernism
in a new direction.

Where were used to seeing
beautiful sleek boxes, you know,

clean lines right angles.

But his approach is incredibly
sculptural

and it's very dramatic.

And he has this wonderful vision

that he can actually think
in three dimensions and draw,

and conceive these bridges
and stations and airports.

And they all have
this wonderful feel

as if they've been modelled
by the hand of an artist.

But behind it is this
muscularity and suppleness

which is really the hand
of the sculpture too.

He has an absolutely
recognisable style.

There is no doubt about that.

It's because of his...his
way he moulds steel and concrete

into these signature forms,
almost.

You know, that er,
often his forms

take the shape of a figure
seven.

And - or they look like things
out of the natural world,

whether it's almost like plants
or whether -

the ribcage of a whale
or something

you might have seen
in the Natural History Museum

[laughs] or something.

But there is this new vocabulary
in architecture.

And then of course you've got
the lovely forms of the bridges,

which are like musical
instruments,

like lyres and harps
on a giant scale,

with all these wonderful
cables and cords

glistening in the sun or lit up
at night.

You know, so there is a real
thrill to these buildings,

which is maintained
in the evening,

as well as during
the day in different lights.

He introduces all these
different,

like - almost like a very
complicated maypole,

these wires twisting and turning
around

as the bridge
takes different angles.

And then he's done
wonderful...

..wonderful tubular bridges.

He's done these arch brace truss
and sometimes they're vertical,

sometimes they're
leaning out or leaning in.

It is all very adventurous
architecture.

And that is really what gives
the excitement to...

..to the first encounter
with any of his bridges,

is that it immediately
seizes your eye.

And then as you go up to it,

you are walking into a piece
of sculpture,

you know, which is constantly
changing as you move across it.

There are certainly other
wonderful bridge builders

but Calatrava
will always delight you.

Narrator: The Swiss bridge
engineer Robert Maillart

was one influence on Calatrava,
but there were others.

In art, Calatrava loved
the figures made

by the Swiss sculptor
Alberto Giacometti.

Now recognised as one
of the foremost sculptors

of the 20th century.

- People like Giacometti
have done, you see,

making these figures of man
walking to see you or...

..or pointing like that, and
always interestingly, you see?

'Mans' by Giacometti
are always moving.

[soft piano music]

A walk like they used to walk
10,000 years ago.

[laughs]

Because you see the walking man,
you know?

And, er, er, you see our body,
the dimensions of our body,

are also almost the same.

Some of us are shorter or bigger
but more or less it's the same.

These basical concepts are,
erm...

very important.

In buildings, it's important
to recall the sense

in the things we touch.

If it is a handrail.
If it is a piece of marble.

If it is a light.
If it is a seat.

If it is, you know, a shop where
I enter to buy something,

if it is the dimension
of a door,

if it is the relation between
the dimension of a door,

the vestibule and the building
opened.

But these things
are all related to myself.

If I have the feeling, you know,
the...the oculus is large,

it's not because it's this
[laughs] something out of...

No, it is because I enter,
there is a door,

there is a vestibule,
and then when I enter there,

I get, oh, you see what I mean?

Or I come through the galleria
with the processional space.

And this is the extraordinary
thing, you see.

So, on the one hand,
you work with this...matter,

you understand?
Which it is almost human.

[stutters]

So you make a - you reference
to the humanness, isn't it,

and at the other side,
you work with a technique,

with our time,
with the modernity,

with the speed, with the trains,
with the subways, you see,

with 300,000 people passing
through and all of that,

which it is an extraordinary
challenge.

Narrator: In architecture,
Calatrava

admired the work
of Eero Saarinen.

The Finnish American
who designed

Washington's Dulles
International Airport

and the TWA Flight Centre
at New York's Idlewild.

Opened in 1962, a year before
the airport was renamed

JFK after President Kennedy

and now restored as a hotel.

[soft music]

Saarinen's approach
was radically different

from what had gone before,
with a dramatic roof,

innovations such as jetways,
baggage carousels, and lounges.

The terminal was designed
to welcome the jet age.

- Extraordinary architecture.

Extraordinary...manifest,
you see, of fate in the future

and at the other side
of art of our time.

You know,
because they are pieces of art.

And...indeed,
there is certainly, you see,

a... [stammers]

..a kind of um...

..let's say also a reference
to the...

..to the work of Saarinen,

to see the idea
of the TWA terminal

seems a little bit,
bit like a bird, you know,

elevating from the ground.

With these very strong two legs
in concrete,

this - who - and even
the...the water spire,

you see, at the end, and
all of that, and even the kerbs.

And also these - the sense
almost of indefined space

at the interior with the poles,
you see?

Where you do not know exactly
where the space will finish,

you see? Because it - and giving
the sense of elevation.

Many of those aspects I try
in a way with all respect,

you understand what I mean?

All respect,
not copy at all, you know?

But in a way, you see, I thought
these are valuable references,

you see, that we should follow
with a big difference.

It is the steel.

When there all is concrete,
here is all steel.

And I know quite something about
steel

because I have built 50 bridges,
all of them in steel.

And many roads and all of that
I think the steel

has until today never been in
the place where it is now in.

[laughs] And had never been
before in the place

where we put it at Ground Zero.

In the - you see these shapes,
you know, these organic shapes,

it done with hard steel,
and porting.

They make - some people ask me
are they decorative?

What about - no, [laughs]
they are porting.

You know, the arcs are porting,
the beams are porting.

The whole thing is interrelated
in an organic way

by the sense of carrying,
you know, the slabs,

the gardens on top of it,
or even the roof itself.

And you see it when the roof
is - it gets opened.

Then you get a gap
of 80 metres,

which it is 250, 260, er, feet.

[stammers]

And this gap is ported, you see,
in the longitudinal way

through...an arc, er,

in the board on both sides,
you see.

Who - and even compensated
by the wing, er, by the wings,

you know? Work on delivering.

So, that finally
the...the bending moment

at the feet of the legs
are very small.

Because that they are also much
smaller than up in the top.

So, there is a lot
of a correlation

between form
giving and static understanding.

To the service of an abstract
idea, you know,

which it is the idea of creating
a beautiful space, and this gap,

you see,
who has a symbolic value.

[soft music]

- Great architecture down
the ages

has always looked back as well
as forward for inspiration.

And of course the Renaissance
is the classic example of that.

And I think what's wonderful
with Calatrava

is the way he actually does
start with Saarinen

and that wonderful sculptural
terminal, uh, for TWA.

What's interesting is that TWA

was very beautifully
symmetrical.

And so although sometimes these
forms look wild,

they are very disciplined,

and there is this discipline
and rigour in Calatrava.

And he's got this wonderful
use of symmetry,

but it never becomes monotonous.

It's always used to create
vistas

and excitement in a building.

But it is all very disciplined.

And there's rhythm,
there's perspective, you know,

all these wonderful
basic elements of architecture

in space, you know,
he is a master of them all.

[uplifting music]

He's introduced this wonderful
drama, actually,

I think, into station building.

I mean, there have been several
great ages of station buildings

in the Victorians
with their great engineering.

But he with his stations
like the one at, er, Lyon

which is a fabulous building,

has introduced
this new vocabulary.

The light in his buildings
is another thing that he -

on the whole, he tends
to go for white concrete.

I mean, he loves his - he

believes in concrete
as the material of...

..of the new century
and the new age and he's...

..he's mastered the ability

to make the most beautiful
concrete,

which is not only a lovely
colour and smooth white.

But catches the light
in this very beautiful way,

and it is the combination
as in the 19th century

of both the light coming through
the glass

and lighting up the concrete,
which gives the stations

this wonderful sort of cathedral
like feel

of being filled with light.

Narrator: In Zurich,
Calatrava's admiration

for Eero Saarinen was evident

in his first infrastructure
project,

The Stadelhofen railway station.

A commission that came out of a
1982 architecture competition.

Here, at the start of his
career,

he had already worked out how to
combine structural engineering

with the soaring and romantic
shapes

that Saarinen had pioneered.

It may seem incredible that,
with these high-tech projects,

Santiago Calatrava relies so
much upon free hand drawing.

But he does.

A scheme for the reworking
of Chicago's O'Hare Airport

started life on Calatrava's
sketch pad.

Like the World Trade Center,
his drawings and watercolours

were taken by others and turned
into computer renders to tempt

the judges in Chicago but his
ideas are firmly rooted in art.

And it works, this year his idea
for O'Hare

was among the finalists
in the design competition.

[soft music]

All these transport interchanges
present a common problem,

how to update them while keeping
the planes, and trains, running.

It was a challenge he would face
30 years later in New York.

Narrator: Zurich, where Santiago
Calatrava lives and works,

holds clues to his thinking

behind the Transportation Hub
at Ground Zero in Manhattan.

But they're not all easy
to find.

At the University of Zurich,
the Law Faculty

wanted to bring its libraries
under one roof.

Calatrava designed a building
within the original building,

a new library filling
what had been a courtyard

but cleverly separated from it.

So that when you're inside
you can read both old and new.

The parapets of the six oval
rings hide the users

of this dramatic space,
the students of the Law Faculty.

The narrow strips of maple
so finely linked,

it's hard to see the joins
give richness and warmth.

And the gaps between them absorb
sound.

This scheme dates from 1989

but it contains one feature
that would come to define

the New York Transportation
Centre 25 years later, the roof.

[soft music]

Santiago Calatrava

gave the Zurich University
Law Library, a skylight.

So that natural light

would filter into all corners
of the courtyard.

Not an ordinary skylight,

one that had a curtain
of collapsible blinds

that can be opened and closed
hydraulically.

In New York Daniel Libeskind,

the master planner of
the regeneration of Ground Zero,

had already conceived
the idea of an open plaza.

A 'wedge of light' he called it,
as a memorial

to the victims
of the Twin Towers' attacks.

In the event that didn't go
ahead.

But in his building now to be
constructed

where Libeskind's plaza
would have been.

Calatrava saw an opportunity
to do something similar

using the glass roof
of the Transportation Centre.

But it would mean going against
Manhattan's famous grid pattern.

- This idea of the wedge
of light

is an extraordinary idea.

And since,
I am in a way transgressing

the wedge of light, I thought I
could orient it, the building.

In a way that it could follow
one of those diagonal,

was very close to the grid
of New York.

But...the building in this case
was lightly tilted.

But in order to cap the grid,
I used the wings.

And did so, that the wings
in plan beyond the referment

you know, the referent,
you know,

to a bird or something like
that.

But they are also strictly
following the grid

when the building is tilted.

And these generate...

..then, the idea of making
this opening.

Letting the light enter.

At, er, 10:29,

the light is going...
is making... [stammers]

..let's say a way of light
in the paving

from one end to another
of the whole hall.

This appropriate
because it's like

a pure architectural tribute.

No written, no words,
it's just pure architecture.

It's light and matter,
ordinated in a way

that in this particular moment,
in this particular way,

even like we do in Stonehenge.

1,000 years of today even if...

[laughs]

..I hope that the building
is still there, isn't it?

We'll remember, you see,
in a way, in a mysterious way,

you know, this will happen,
this in the...

11th of September.

Narrator: September 6th, 2005.

Santiago Calatrava's daughter,
Sofia,

is given the day off school
to launch two doves.

As they break ground

at the World Trade Center
Transportation Hub.

New York Senator Hillary Clinton
is here,

City Mayor Michael Bloomberg,

and the banner says, 'A soaring
concept, an historic occasion.'

It was day one of a project

that would take more
than 10 years to realise.

There was no question
of stopping the trains,

so the station had to be built
around them.

Security concerns meant the fins
had to be redesigned,

made thicker.

There were other revisions
and controversy over the cost,

doubling from the planned two
billion dollars to four billion.

But there was affection among
the workers responsible

for assembling this homage
to the 21st century traveller.

Slowly, an unusual building
emerged.

As the main hall came together,

the construction crews nicknamed
it, 'The Oculus'

and the name stuck.

Santiago Calatrava had designed
a central space

that was all white,
like his most famous bridges.

330 feet long, 160 feet high.

'The New York Times' called it,
'breathtaking'.

It was a nod to the famous
concourse at Grand Central

but with modern architecture
using modern materials.

And he had contrived
a progression

for those arriving and leaving.

Using an east-west corridor
linked to the main hall.

All the time allowing users
of the station

to see what was ahead.

- I arrive into a space
who prepares me.

Then I am - the subway
is passing through, and...

..and this compress me and then
I enter into the oculus.

I mean, finally the whole job
was to ordinate

those things in a way that these
processional character appear.

We has no change of subway
that was there.

Also the east-west corridor was
part of the overall master plan.

It has also been there before.

The oculus is so located
that you,

being in the east-west corridor
you see all the way through.

Until the end of the oculus,
which it is also an advantage.

Being that the height
and the sequence

of the spaces in different
heights, but still you see,

you see where you are going,
it is not a labyrinthic feeling.

It is the east-west corridor,
this galleria,

is part, a substantial part,

of the effect of one east-west
corridor, two stations,

another type of face,
and third, oculus.

You see, one, two, three.

I wanted to do something that
really, that,

er, the quality of the overall
promenade, you know.

That compels the people until
the trains, isn't it?

This was one.

And, um, then you arrive
into the oculus,

and the oculus was
like an occlusion, you see?

Like suddenly, you see,
you see, you have the feeling,

I am in a plaza of New York.

This was my ambition, although
I am almost three levels

in the underground, isn't it?

And the idea of rising
to the oculus and opening,

you know, up.

And seeing the transparency
through the steel ribs,

and this sense of enormous
space.

Very generous space, my opinion,
a genuinely...a genuinely

New Yorker space, you see, it
was like arriving to a place.

I am in New York.

What I am seeing is not a piece
of steel

bolted to another piece of steel

or welded to another piece
of steel. No.

It's something who is far beyond

the material, er,
the material context.

As material as the
architecture is...

[stutters]

..and...and...

..it comes to me the sense of...
the musical part, you know?

If it was music, it will be very
easy to explain that.

Because the music happens
in a second, you understand,

and then disappear, and can move
the people, isn't it?

They are melodies and music,

you know, who will touch
the people deeply, you see?

And...[stammers]

..and architecture in a way
as material as it is,

and as tangible it is, you see,

can do also very similar
to the music.

Narrator: This may be the one
project in his career

that has moved Santiago
Calatrava more than any other.

The opportunity to create what
he now calls,

'A Monument to Life.'

The privilege of working
in a city

where his hero Eero Saarinen,

created exciting shapes
50 years earlier.

The realisation of his art
in built form,

his gift to the public realm

of one of the world's most
iconic cities.

All these things came together

in the World Trade
Centre Transportation Hub.

- There is something I hope,
I hope in this type of approach

and in this building who comes
against to life.

It is a recall
to the extraordinary work

of people like Saarinen.

Was an epoch.

Or even before Grand Central.

Or even before the Brooklyn
Bridge or things like that.

So there is a spirit.

It is a spirit who - the...

..finally the only constant
is New York.

Do you understand?
It is New York.

So, there are places where
the ground is fertile,

and it is ready, you know,
to do these kind of gestures.

Of course you need a special
circumstance.

You need - speaking from
the Greeks,

you know, going back, a little
bit the sense of the tragedy.

And September 11th was an
enormous tragedy, isn't it?

So you need the people
in front of the tragedy,

they don't submit, they don't
say oh, my goodness, no.

They say the life goes ahead.

We have to rebuild it and even
like the ancient Greeks,

you know, we will rebuild
the Parthenon

and it will be even better.

And...and the ground
is New York, you know,

which it is not only
an important city

in the United States but in a
way is a kind of world capital.

[soft music]

In French there is a word
that I think works very well.

Is, amateur.

[laughs] Amateur,

means not necessarily
dilettante, you understand?

It's not dilettante.
It's amateur.

Amateur is somebody who lives
or loves...no, who loves

the - I mean, ame, ame means
you know, to love, isn't it?

And amateur is somebody
who loves.

So I love sculpture,
I love engineering,

I love architecture [laughs]

and I try to deal, you see,

with all the three
as there was...

a single thing serving
each other.

Eventually all of them serving
to the art of architecture.

Captioned by Ai-Media
ai-media.tv

Narrator: Next time,
35 years after it was

left for dead, Battersea Power
Station is being restored.

Designed by
Sir Giles Gilbert Scott,

the man who created
the red telephone kiosk,

this London landmark was rescued
by a Malaysian consortium which

selected architects
WilkinsonEyre

to give it a new life.

The most incredible thing about
it is the sheer scale of it.

This absolutely
enormous space.

And then there's always more
to discover.

You go in a bit further
or you go up

into one of either
switch houses on either side,

then you find those
extraordinary control rooms.

You know, they're sort of
beautifully designed.

Everything very carefully
designed and worked through.

It's just an awesome space.