As viewers gaze in wonderment at the magnificent teal Sky Ceiling, Crean and Parnass' Oculus tempts our imaginations with a star that begins to pulse. It then arcs as if it were a shooting star to the Ceiling's center and expands into a large oculus, filled with an idyllic, bright blue sky studded with white clouds. Like that of the Pantheon, the oculus transports viewers elsewhere‹almost to a state of reverie‹while giving us the rare opportunity to view the sky uninhibited by the City's skyscrapers. Several doves appear from the concourse's upper windows and search the ceiling for an escape until they find the oculus portal and fly away. This magical vision ends as Oculus contracts into a bright point of light and then gently fades away.
Melanie Crean is a video, installation, and effects artist who has exhibited in the United States and Europe. Crean has a BA with honors in Semiotics from Brown University where she concentrated on film production and theory, and an MFA from the School of Visual Arts where she focused on interactive installation and computer animation. Jordan Parnass is an architect and multimedia installation artist working in New York City. In addition to numerous published architectural projects, his work includes interactive sound and video installations in the United States and abroad. Parnass holds BAs in art and semiotics from Brown University, as well as a Master's degree in architecture from Columbia University, and was a founding partner at a+i design corp before leaving to start Jordan Parnass Digital Architecture in 1997.
