Qianyu Liu

INTRODUCTION

In the opening ceremony of the Atlanta Centennial Olympic Games of 1996, millions of people watched Muhammad Ali as a cultural icon carried the Olympic flame torch to light the cauldron. He was shaking from his Parkinson’s, and it was an emotional moment for many people. Atlanta Cauldron Tower was designed by a pioneer contemporary artist, Siah Armajani, who produced a monolithic uninhabited sculpture you cannot climb. The tower of 106ft is still prominent when we look back to the historic photographs today.

However, the tower lost the context it relied upon along with the partial demolition of Centennial Stadium in 1997, when it was moved to the current isolated location on Hank Aaron Drive, on the edge of a bleak parking lot.

As a valued artifact of historic heritage, does the collapse of the context declares the death of the iconic architecture? This architecture is not permanently lost, but it is already dead from social significance. The collapse of its context and its removal robs the Atlanta Cauldron Tower of its symbolic meaning. By proposing the relocation to the Centennial Olympic Park in downtown Atlanta, the thesis will explore a way to rehost an architecture object that has lost context, while reactivating the city’s memory in the process.

20:00, JULY 19, 1996, ATLANTA

Photograph of Atlanta Cauldron Tower

THE COLLAPSE OF THE CONTEXT

The cauldron tower was detached and moved to its current location on Hank Aaron Drive.

Centennial Olympic Park has become the epicenter of a revitalized Downtown tourist district and millions of visitors visit here in four seasons. The diagram on the right highlights all the tourist attractions. CNN Center, convention center, the world's’ largest aquarium, the museum of Coca-Cola etc., all of them are here. Move the tower here can guarantee the most exposure. With a little creativity, the Atlanta Cauldron Tower could become Atlanta’s most defining tourist attraction