Mobile concert hall designed

Ark Nova, a plastic, balloon-like structure that looks like a lopsided, purple doughnut, is the world’s first portable, inflatable concert hall. It seats an audience of up to 500 on rows of mounted wooden benches. Conceptualized and designed for the victims of the tsunami that struck Japan in 2011, the plastic, balloon-like structure was the handiwork of Japanese architect Arata Isozaki and London sculptor Anish Kapoor. In September 2013, it made its debut for a special edition of the Lucerne Festival in Matsushima near the city of Sendai, where the tsunami hit two years ago. The artwork was first planned by Michael Haefliger, director of the Lucerne Festival in Switzerland, and Alan Gilbert, music director of the New York Philharmonic who is half Japanese.

Read the full story in the New York Times.