STOCKHOLM.- The Princess Estelle Cultural Foundation presents Aurora Borealis Star Dome, a new permanent commission by Spanish artist Cristina Iglesias for the Princess Estelle Sculpture Park in Stockholm. The work is conceived as an immersive sculptural environment at the intersection of architecture, sculpture, and nature, inspired by the aurora borealis that illuminates the skies of northern Sweden each winter, as well as the site’s historical and cultural context. Aurora Borealis Star Dome will be inaugurated by HRH Prince Daniel of Sweden at an official ceremony on 2 June and is open to the public year-round.

One of the most significant sculptors of our time, Cristina Iglesias has, throughout her career, created large-scale public installations in materials including bronze, steel, glass, and water, often engaging with the histories of the sites in which they are situated. A recurring theme in her practice is the exploration of the hidden layers of the city and the presence of nature within urban environments.

The Princess Estelle Sculpture Park forms part of Royal Djurgården, a vast public park and recreation area in central Stockholm. The commission of Iglesias’s sculpture continues the Foundation's vision of presenting works that are intrinsically connected the site, or that engage with the cultural heritage of the park.

During the 17th and 18th centuries, the location formed part of a so-called “hunting star” within the royal park, before later evolving into a public lookout. With the installation of Iglesias’s sculpture, the site is once again reimagined as a place of outlook and contemplation, inviting visitors to pause for reflection and introspection.

Iglesias has created a 5-metre-high dome-like structure composed of branch-like forms cast in aluminium that appear to emerge from the surrounding terrain. At the top of the sculpture, a lantern of coloured glass – shifting from darkest blue to lightest green – captures and filters daylight, evoking the Northern Lights. Iglesias describes the work as “A sanctuary – a place for contemplation, reflection and meditation – an invitation to connect with the cosmos.”

Visitors are invited to enter the sculpture, sit or lie beneath the dome, and experience how the light shifts over time while observing the surrounding landscape through the architectural structure.

“Cristina Iglesias’ work in the Princess Estelle Sculpture Park will lead visitors to a hidden place in the forest at the area’s highest point. There they will encounter an immersive sculpture that can be entered, where coloured glass panels in the ceiling create the illusion of sweeping Northern Lights. Bringing new life to a culturally significant yet somewhat forgotten place, Iglesia’s sculpture will create a new gathering place for a contemplative encounter with art in nature,” states Sara Sandström, Executive Director of the Princess Estelle Cultural Foundation.

Cristina Iglesias, born in November 1956 in Donostia–San Sebastián, Spain, lives and works in Madrid. She studied chemistry at the Universidad del País Vasco before attending the Chelsea School of Art in London. In 1995, she was appointed Professor of Sculpture at the Akademie der Bildenden Künste München.

Widely recognized for her monumental public installations, her work has been exhibited internationally, including Landscape and Memory (2022) in New York, Hondalea (2021) on Santa Clara Island in Spain, Forgotten Streams (2017) in London, Tres Aguas (2014) in Toledo, and Door – Threshold (2006–2007) at the Prado Museum in Madrid.

Iglesias has received several prestigious awards, including the Spanish National Prize for Visual Arts in 1999 and the Royal Academy Architecture Prize in London in 2020. She has represented Spain at the Venice Biennale twice, in 1986 and 1993, and participated in many of the world’s most prestigious biennials. Her work is represented in major public collections, including Tate Modern in London, Centre Pompidou in Paris, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, and MoMA in New York.

Aurora Borealis Star Dome will be Iglesias’ second permanent work in Sweden.