Last month, two members of the UMAYA team visited the Skyspace by James Turrell in José Ignacio, Uruguay.

Part of the experience was waking up at 4:30 am. The Skyspace runs specific light sequences around sunrise and sunset, so arriving before dawn is part of the experience.

The building sits quietly within the landscape, almost hidden in the terrain. Visitors enter through a simple passage that leads into a circular chamber. At the center of the ceiling there is a precisely cut opening framing the sky.

Inside, a circular bench runs along the perimeter of the room. Visitors are given sheep skins and many choose to lie down directly beneath the opening, looking straight up at the sky. This makes the experience more immersive, allowing the sky to fill your entire field of vision.

Before sunrise the space is very dark. As people take their seats, the artificial lighting inside the chamber begins a slow sequence of color changes. Reds shift into magenta and violet tones while the sky above gradually moves from black to deep blue.

What is interesting is how the colored light inside the room changes the way you perceive the sky. The sky itself remains the same, but it appears to shift tone and depth depending on the color surrounding it.

As the sun approaches the horizon, the artificial light fades and natural daylight takes over. The moment when the sky transitions from night to the first morning tones becomes very noticeable because the opening isolates the sky like a framed surface.

For our team, the visit was a reminder of how powerful contrast, perception, and control of light can be. Turrell’s Skyspaces are not about illuminating architecture. They are about carefully shaping the conditions that allow people to notice light itself.

There are Skyspaces located around the world, each calibrated to its specific sky conditions. Experiencing the one in José Ignacio was a great opportunity for the UMAYA team to observe how minimal architecture and precise lighting can create a very strong spatial experience.