Page 5 - AIT1218_CanLis_Haus

are the same that surround the visitor indoors. With side light, they gain an almost
textile quality due to the craft-like processing. The archaic stone-cutting saws inci-
sed deep patterns into the material. Their image reminds of fish skeletons or
feathered stalks. In repetition, ornamental patterns are produced, wallpaper motifs
almost, borders, tendrils, décors. They are the most attractive feature of the house.
They are created by the light, the play of the sun on and with the topography of the
house. Over the course of the day, every wall is by and by touched by the light and
thus, hour by hour and room after room, it gains a new magic quality. Life in the
house follows this rhythm – from the studio- and the guest wing to the bedrooms,
to the high-ceilinged living room and the kitchen building with the colonnade cour-
tyard open towards the sea all the way to the roofless observatory in the very west
of the ensemble. This is where the sun sets and with it the ornament of the day dis-
appears. And a second theme of the house becomes manifest: Let us call it the
ornament of the night! When Can Lis was constructed, the street in front of the
house was not yet called Avinguda Jørn Utzon but Calle de la Media Luna, half-
moon street. That is because the rock in the sea where the house stands forms an
enormous, natural observatory from which every evening the spectacle of the rising
and setting of the moon can be admired. In summer, the heavenly body rises on
the horizon at about 9 p.m., makes its way through the waves of the sea, higher
and higher, and reaches its zenith exactly opposite the large kitchen courtyard Speisesaal (oben) und Küche (unten) öffnen sich ... • Dining room (top) and kitchen (below) open ...
which is the secret, the family heart of the home. Next to it, Utzon dedicated a
whole room to the moon: four walls open to the sky. The wall towards the sea, cut-
out in a semicircle, directs the gaze like through a telescope to the path of the moon
through the firmament. A second, smaller semicircle in the western wall marks
where the moon sets.
Sun and moon determine the rhythm of the house

The theme is present everywhere in the house: in the masonry crescent moon in
the entrance area, in the arches of the barrel-vaulted ceilings, in the circle segments ... über große Glasfenster zu einem Kolonnadenhof. • ... to a colonnade courtyard with large glass windows.
of the monk-and-nun roof tiles of the various wall copings. For more than 20 years,
Utzon lived in this house, with the course of the heavenly bodies, of the sun and
the moon determining his daily rhythm. Then he moved on – into the interior. The
glaring sunlight and its reflections in the sea to which one is inevitably exposed in
Can Lis had weakened Utzon’s vision. And thus the architect in his mid-seventies
once again built a house on Mallorca for himself: Can Feliz, ten kilometres from the
sea. The family owns the house to this day whereas, after the death of the architect
in 2008, Can Lis became the property of the Utzon Foundation. The Foundation
refurbished the building in 2011 and 2012. Since then, it has awarded residency fel-
lowships to young architects and makes the house available to groups of university
students. Utzon, who would be celebrating his 100th birthday this year, would be
very pleased with this type of use.

Grundriss • Floor plan

AIT 12.2018 • 061