Epidavros

William Pye was commissioned by Dolby Laboratories to create a new sculpture for the entrance to the company’s new headquarters. The commission incorporated three disciplines: sculpture, landscape design and architecture, which Pye achieved by creating a paved courtyard as a setting for a water sculpture. The water sculpture comprises a raised pool which overflows, the water descending over a textured bronze weir to a lower, circular pool.

The title of the sculpture reflects its form, Epidavros being the site of an ancient Greek theatre in the Peleponese Peninsula, where tiers of stone seating are set into the hillside.

In their design for the theatre the Greeks acknowledged the terrain whilst imposing human order upon it - the apotheosis of hard landscaping exemplifying the combination of sculpture, landscape and architecture.

At Dolby Laboratories, Pye’s Epidavros with its bronze, fan-shaped weir is reminiscent of the ancient auditorium, with the lower pool implying the stage. A playful quirk of this commission is that the sculpture and courtyard are set above the theatre and cinema of Dolby Laboratories.