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SERIEN  PERSPEKTIVWECHSEL  •  CHANGE OF PERSPECTIVE


                                                                         this medium. It quasi became an obsession for me to revive this art form and free it from
                                                                         the rigid ideological corset of the past. For me, the panorama is a medium of our time, it
                                                                         combines painting with stage design, theatre and cinematic image effects.

                                                                         r As you say, you devoted yourself to drawing at a young age. How important is it in
                                                                         your profession to master these skills?
                                                                         One cannot emphasize enough how important drawing is. Not only for my profession,
                                                                         but as a general means of experiencing the world. It is a cultural form that should not
                                                                         be underestimated, for me one of the greatest achievements of humanity. And although I
                                                                         work a lot with the computer, it’s impossible to make a panorama without the knowledge
                                                                         of drawing and perspective. The great thing is that you can visualize the conceptual process
                                                                         of finding the subject and the point of view. Sketching the composition is an immensely
                                                                         important, lengthy process. Each panorama works compositionally both as an overall
                                                                         image and in many individual sections that stand on their own.
           Foto: Carola Krekow; Copright Asisi                           r And how time-consuming are the preliminary and research work for a project – on


                                                                         site, in cooperation with project partners, scientists and your team?
                                                                         The process always takes a few years. My team consists of a core team of about 15 people
                                                                         and other project partners, specialists and artists. These include Eric Babak, a composer

                                                                         Jörg Tritthardt, structural engineer for textile constructions, and a few others. For many
           Yadegar Asisi inszeniert das Licht für „Die Kathedrale von Monet – Die Hoffnung der Moderne“ (2020) ...  friend who has been contributing the soundtrack to my panoramas for many years; then
                                                                         visitors, the effort behind it is not even apparent, simply because the finished picture
           ... im Panorama XXL in Rouen. BesucherInnen können das Panorama von verschiedenen Standpunkten erleben.  usually looks very self-contained and realistic – but that’s a good thing.

                                                                         r  The Panometer Leipzig – a neologism made up of panorama and gasometer –
                                                                         celebrates its 20th birthday this year. What does this anniversary mean to you?
                                                                         Without the Panometer Leipzig, the revival of the art form of the panorama would not
                                                                         have been possible and today it occupies a special position, as a premiere house. There
                                                                         are numerous other locations – Berlin, Leipzig, Dresden, the city of Luther Wittenberg,
                                                                         Pforzheim. Soon Vienna and Constance will be added. I like to look back on the past 20
                                                                         years in Leipzig. There has been constant development. I still have many themes that I
                                                                         would like to realize. In the Panometer, everything is already planned until 2030.


                                                                         r The panorama New York 9/11 – War in Times of Peace is currently on show in Leipzig.
                                                                         What can visitors expect there?
                                                                         New York 9/11 will be on show in Leipzig until spring 2024. I came up with the theme
           Foto: Carola Krekow; Coprigh Asisi                            the World Trade Center, because I contributed a panorama to Daniel Libeskind’s design.
                                                                         partly through my involvement in the architectural competition for the reconstruction of
                                                                         Shortly after the attacks, I was in the pit where the Twin Towers used to stand. That is why
                                                                         I have a personal relationship with that place. Ten years later, it must have been in 2010,
                                                                         I realized what had become of those attacks. Our response was violence in the form of
                                                                         the so-called “war on terror” that claimed over a million lives, devastated whole swathes
                                                                         of land and sowed hatred for many generations. I could not help but ask questions
           Das 360°-Panorama „Great Barrier Reef“ faszinierte in Leipzig (2015), Rouen (2017) und Pforzheim (2018).   about the causes and consequences of this violence. In the panorama, we return to the
                                                                         starting point. When we think of September 11, everyone immediately has the image of the
                                                                         terrorist attacks in mind. But that’s not what I wanted to show. What we see is a moment
                                                                                                                                   th
                                                                         that fascinates by its normality. We are in a very banal street scene at 8.41 a.m. on 11
                                                                         September 2001 and see the still intact world with the Twin Towers. In the guided tour,
                                                                         however, I first talk about the consequences of the attacks, the reappraisal of the “war on
                                                                         terror” in installations that hopefully create a feeling for this monstrosity. It is my personal
                                                                         statement against the wars of our present and also my fourth anti-war project.

                                                                         r Idea, concept, technique, poetry, mood – your panoramas are not that far removed
                                                                         from architecture. But you seem to be much freer ...
                                                                         Yes, I can choose my subjects freely and am absolutely independent in the way I realize
                                                                         them. Probably not many architects can claim that.  But I do have a wish. However, I don’t
                                                                         know if I can realize it, because it is very, very complex. I would like to show a city in 200
                                                                         years. But not as the dystopia that is so common today, but as a utopian model city, as an
                                                                         absolutely positive image of the future. I want to create a world that people would like to
                                                                         live in, not as a dream or fantasy, but based on what we know today. What development
           Foto: Copyright Asisi                                         of the city as a place of living together can we imagine? For this positive vision of the future,
                                                                         I can also well imagine working together with other architects again. That would then
                                                                         perhaps be my contribution to the future of architecture.

           038  •  AIT 09.2023
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