We return to Plaza de Castilla, we already told you that one day we would talk about Box Obelisk or Obelisk of Calatrava. Indeed it is a work of Santiago Calatrava, the only one of the Valencian in Madrid, which forms a group with the Kio Towers and its Gate of Europe.

In this work Calatrava acts as architect, engineer and sculptor. These were his words on the day of its inauguration: “a unique piece, never before conceived, that straddles architecture, sculpture and engineering”. I continue saying ““It is a mobile obelisk that participates in the masculinity of the vertical and the delicacy and femininity of movement.”. But he did not attend the inauguration, not him, but the King did. Juan Carlos I; the Minister of Housing, Beatriz Corredor, and the mayor of Madrid, Alberto Ruiz-Gallardón. Only he is missing. We were in 2009.

Its obelisk is a steel and bronze cylinder 93 meters high, two meters in diameter and weighing 572 tons. Its surface is lined with bronze bars covered in gold leaf. These bars are equipped with a gentle oscillating movement that is transmitted through the ends of the 493 sheets. As the builders explained, this movement gives rise to the sensation of a wave along the mast. That's how we should see it and that was its main attraction, however, it only worked for the first few weeks, and for very little time, I leave you a video that I found on YouTube where you can see it in operation.

The reason, achieving this movement is expensive, maintaining the computer system and the garden meant 300.000 euros a year, almost nothing, about 50 million pesetas.

I wanted to represent modernity and the future, but it has been more of embarrassment and suspicion. He gift (poisoned) from the Caja Madrid Foundation to Madrid, when Alberto Ruiz-Gallardón was mayor, it cost more than 14 million euros and has now been valued at 100.000 euros, that is, it is worth a third of what it costs to keep it in operation for a year. Something doesn't add up to these accounts, right? Even so, Ruiz-Gallardón defined it as "the exponent of how we want to build this Madrid of the 21st century."

It seems that Calatrava was inspired by the Infinity Column o Endless Column by Romanian sculptor Constantin Brâncusi, inaugurated in Târgu-Jiu, Romania in 1938.

What do you think, would you start it?

A abrazo.