Mies's Opaque Cube: The Electric Utilities Pavilion at the 1929 Barcelona International Exposition focuses on the dramatic, opaque, white cube-shaped building designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe for the German electricity industry's display at the exposition. Like many emblematic projects of modern architecture, the pavilion was created for a temporary exhibition and is known only through the photographic and graphic documentation of the era. Mies used the Electricity Supply Company Pavilion to experiment with a variety of ideas, including the use of photo murals and a new expression of structure and space, that featured in his later buildings. Through archival research, Laura Lizondo Sevilla has reconstructed this pavilion, the original plans for which no longer exist, and her article reinterprets the building's contribution to Mies's subsequent architecture.

You do not currently have access to this content.