Heinz Mack’s ‘The Sky Over Nine Columns’ unveiled on the Island of San Giorgio Maggiore

On June 3, 2014, The Sky Over Nine Columns was unveiled on the Island of San Giorgio Maggiore. The installation by the German artist Heinz Mack will remain in place from June 3 to November 23, 2014, in concomitance with the Venice Architecture Biennale. Staged in collaboration with the Giorgio Cini Foundation and curated by the art historian Robert Fleck, the installation in the church square on San Giorgio consists of nine symmetric columns over seven metres high covered with a golden mosaic and bearing the sky. For Heinz Mack the columns decorated with 850,000 tesserae are instruments for a play of light. By day and night they reflect the light of the sun and the moon over Venice and be mirrored in the water. The artist sees the golden mosaic as a tribute to the city of Venice and its tradition in the transit between Orient and Occident. “The column represents man standing upright