Licht und Bewegung / Light and Motion

The owner of Wormland (a men’s department store) commissioned Otto Piene for an artwork to be installed on a building designed by architect Peter Neufert on Hohe Straße. Piene created what was his largest kinetic light sculpture at the time, incorporating the entire building facade. From the top of the ground floor up to the edge of the roof, the wall was covered with shiny square metal plates. Each plate is shaped like a flat pyramid, giving the facade a modeled sculptural form, while reflecting as much light as possible — like a polished gemstone. Numerous rods project from the facade and are furnished with spherical tips with lights inside. At the center of the composition along the upper half of the facade is a rotatable wheel, which also has several rods with spherical lights mounted to its perimeter like rays. A vertical axis above the wheel towers up above the edge of the roof.
The installation was programmed electronically and once offered an impressive choreography of light and shadow along the entire building and beyond. Unfortunately, the mechanics and electronics have long been out of service; however, efforts have been made in recent years to restore them.

Reference: http://m.skulpturenfuehrer.de/de/skulpturenfuehrer-koeln/ort/licht-und-bewegung