Studio AI Architects with EOC Engineers designed the structural engineering and construction framework for "Mobius Houston" (2019) — a major public sculpture by New York-based Uruguayan artist Marta Chilindron, commissioned by the Public Art of the University of Houston System (Public Art UHS) as the inaugural piece of its new Temporary Public Art Program. Local fabrication and assembly was managed by Metalab Studio in Houston.

At 11 feet tall and 22 feet wide, Mobius Houston was Chilindron's first large-scale public art installation in Texas — a significant scale-up from her smaller 2013 Mobius series. The sculpture is composed of colorful transparent trapezoids that fold and overlap, creating new colors at every intersection. Both transparent and reflective, its shadows are cast in color throughout the day as the sun moves across the sky. The work was installed at Wilhelmina's Grove on the University of Houston campus in October 2019.

Chilindron's practice explores the relationship between geometry, color, and movement — her collapsible, hinged sculptures in transparent acrylic are held in the permanent collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Blanton Museum, the Museum of Fine Arts Houston, El Museo del Barrio, and the Centre Pompidou. Bridging the demands of large-scale structural engineering with the precision of kinetic art is exactly the kind of challenge where architecture and art become indistinguishable.

Artist: Marta Chilindron

Work: Mobius Houston, 2019

Material: Transparent acrylic, structural steel armature

Dimensions: 11 ft high × 22 ft wide

Location: Wilhelmina's Grove, University of Houston, Texas

Commissioned by: Public Art of the University of Houston System (Public Art UHS)

Architect: Studio AI Architects, New York

Structural Engineering Feasibility: EOC Engineers, New York

Local fabrication lead: Metalab Studio, Houston

Project video