El helicoids
El Helicoide is a spiral-shaped building in Caracas , which serves as the headquarters of the Venezuelan secret service "Servicio Bolivariano de Inteligencia Nacional" ( SEBIN ) and as a prison.
history
The construction of the building as a shopping center, with its drivable ramp designed as a "hymn to consumption", began in 1956 under President Marcos Pérez Jiménez . The first phase of construction was completed in 1961. It was planned by the architects Pedro Neuberger, Dirk Bornhorst and Jorge Romero Gutiérrez. In addition to the shopping center, an exhibition for industries, a five-star hotel, a park, a private club for the owners and a show palace on the seventh level were planned. Cars can drive and park on a four-kilometer long, winding ramp up to the dome of the building.
The interior of the building came to a temporary standstill in 1961 due to budget problems. In the same year the project was presented at the Museum of Modern Art in New York . Until 1982, only the geodesic dome with its aluminum roof was completed to complete the concrete infrastructure. From 1984 state institutions were housed in the building, the most important of which is the Venezuelan secret service SEBIN. The dome was damaged in a bomb attack during the Venezuelan coup in 1992 . Since 2010, part of the building has served as the headquarters of the National Experimental Safety University (UNES). It is also used as a prison and, according to media reports, is "one of the most notorious prisons in Venezuela". Human rights organizations report deaths from inhumane detention conditions in the complex.
Dimensions
- Total floor area: 101,940 m²
- Built-up area: 77 748 m²
- Business premises: 46,715 m²
- Paths and green space: 29 192 m²
- Industrial and exhibition space: 8 445 m²
Movie
- El Helicoide: The Shopping Mall That Became A Torture Prison Documentary, United Kingdom, 2019, 21:41 min., Production: BBC , First broadcast: January 29, 2019 on BBC World News, Summary of the BBC, Video on YouTube .
literature
Celeste Olalquiaga, Lisa Blackmore: Downward Spiral: El Helicoide's Descent from Mall to Prison Textbook Binding . 2018, ISBN 1-947198-00-9 .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ "We will fight your war" , Novaya Gazeta , "In Venezuela the diagnosis of" malnutrition "is forbidden, women are being sterilized, the shopping center has become a torture center and the regime is accusing other countries"
- ↑ Behind bars in Caracas. Die Welt, December 23, 2018, accessed December 29, 2018 .
Coordinates: 10 ° 29 '21.8 " N , 66 ° 54' 35.6" W.