Word: beeswax
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...massive lintels, and the low triangular-coffered ceiling in areas off the atrium, are made of exposed reinforced concrete. But it is not the coarse béton brut introduced to architecture by Le Corbusier. The concrete looks almost as fine as beeswax. Poured into forms as carefully made as cabinets, and impregnated with marble dust, it becomes an extraordinarily subtle substance with a pink surface bloom. Though the building looks handmade throughout, it is reticently so. Nothing in its materials or their articulation interferes with the job in hand: to display works of art in tranquillity...
...cultures of Peru used hammered sheets as their basic material, but the Colombian artisans preferred to cast their images from gold. They were masters of the lost-wax technique, whereby a model of clay and charcoal was formed and then covered with thin sheets and threads of finely worked beeswax; this was mantled with clay and dried, then heated, so that the wax ran out of the mold and molten metal could be poured in to take its place...