Olympic Glory

There are quite a few structures in Barcelona that illustrate its rich cultural heritage and advanced methods of preservation. Then, there are the moderns.

Like the water company offices, known locally as Le Suppositorium for its shape (it looks like a giant suppository or worse depending on your imagination) and the concept of unnatural insertion of modern skyscrapers in a relatively rural and historic fabric. There is also the Needle building, which during its construction in the early 1980s was an unwelcome reminder of Barcelona’s trouble with street drugs, especially heroin (if you haven’t already guessed, it looks like a large hypodermic injecting itself into the tallest mountain surrounding the city).

But some structures, like the telecommunications tower built for the 1992 Olympic Games, add both function and curiosity to the overall composition of the city. At first glance it looked to me a bit like a sewing machine, poised and ready to quilt together the world through advanced cell phone coverage. But after a thorough explanation today, I discovered that the designer (both engineer and sculptor) envisioned not an oversized “Singer Serger,” but a figure kneeling as though to accept an award. It is difficult to describe to someone who has never seen the structure, so I will make my first foray into publishing photographs with my blog a little later – if there is a picture, you’ll know I was successful. Otherwise, you’ll just have to take my word for it when I write that it is a unique and interesting structure that I feel does contribute to the overall skyline of the city.

The Olympic compound in general is fairly spectacular, if virtually unused. There was our small group, the Fat Tire bicycle tour, and a handful of grade school kids who came flying down the stairs in a screaming flailing ball of energy to launch themselves at the small bit of grass to be found here. The former home to the world’s greatest athletes is mostly abandoned. Little or nothing happens here, and the stadium area shows signs of decay and neglect. The delicate neo-Romanesque façade of the stadium is pocked with water marks and failing plaster. There are “temporary” barricades blocking off the entire lower half of the park which show no signs of being removed any time soon. The whole thing calls to mind Atlanta’s own Centennial Olympic park and its consistently doomed efforts to make it a place people will want to come.

In the meantime, the tourist trade seems to be the only thing really happening in the former mountains of Barcelona. There is a museum in the former main hall, which does have a spectacular exhibit on 12th Century frescoes of various rural churches from throughout Northern Spain. The grand staircase that leads up up up to the building looks like it should be popular with joggers, but really just holds the stagnant “magic” fountains that are only turned on for Friday and Saturday evening – why then, I have no idea.

For me, the greatest remnant is the German Pavilion. Actually dismantled after the Olympics, it was rebuilt during the 1980’s and took almost 3 years to reconstruct. It is a crisp and clean look at modern architecture before its time, and the international style at its peak. Most people walk right by it and don’t even notice it. Probably the lack of towers…