Artist Carsten Höller created an unsettling five-degree spiral staircase for the Diedo Palace in Venice.
Heller installed the piece, designed as both a work of art and a functional staircase, as part of the Italian architect’s renovation of the 18th-century Palazzo Diedo. Silbo Fassi.
The building was built within an unfinished staircase that had been abandoned after being designed by the palace’s original architect. Andrea Tiralidied.
Named the “Doubt Stairs,” each tread is positioned at a five-degree angle, intended to create a slight sense of uncertainty for users.
“Carsten Höller is famous for his slides, but now he’s tried his hand at building an oval staircase,” explained curator Wald Hauser.
“He must have had in mind the staircases of Palazzo Contarini del Bovolo and Palladio’s Venice, which are tilted, presumably like the entire city and the human heart. How do we deal with verticality and order in general when the world we live in is not straight?”
The staircase connects the first and second floors of the historic palace, which recently reopened as the Berggruen Museum of Contemporary Art & Culture.
Each staircase is made of Vicenza stone and supported by a black iron frame connected to the walls of the palace and to the base of a central balustrade.
The overall shape is similar to another famous set of staircases in the city.
It recalls the spiral staircase designed by Italian architect Palladio for the Accademia Gallery in the 16th century, as well as the arcaded staircase of the 15th century Palazzo Contarini del Bovolo.
German artist Heller is best known for his series of slides in unusual locations.
These include a courtyard slide in Florence’s Strozzi Palace, beside a shopping mall in Miami and inside the Anish Kapoor-designed ArcelorMittal Orbit in London’s Olympic Park.
Photography by Massimo Pistore, courtesy of Carsten Höller Studio and Palazzo Diedo / Berggruen Arts & Culture.