The Geometry of Silence

We build to keep the wind out. We build to mark a place where we might stand, if only for a moment, against the vastness of the sky. Stone is heavy, yet it holds the light in ways that flesh cannot. There is a specific kind of loneliness found in large, empty spaces—a coldness that has nothing to do with temperature. It is the silence of architecture waiting for a witness. We walk through these corridors, our footsteps swallowed by the floor, our presence a mere flicker in the history of the walls. We are small, and the structures we raise are meant to outlast our own brief, shivering lives. Yet, even in the most rigid geometry, there is a desire for something soft. A longing for a point of contact, a single thread to pull the weight of the stone into focus. Does the building know we are here, or are we simply shadows passing through its long, measured breath?

Bashar Alaeddin has captured this stillness in his work titled Double Starburst. He has found the exact point where the stone meets the light, and where a person becomes a part of the architecture. Does this alignment feel like a beginning or an end to you?