Get curated editors’ picks, peeks behind the scenes, film recommendations and more.
Towering above the nearby blocks in the Eixample district of Barcelona, the Sagrada Família is unmistakable for its colossal scale and its convention-defying architecture. Looking like a Gothic cathedral seen through a surreal fairytale filter, this is the most audacious project of the influential Catalan architect Antoni Gaudí (1852-1926). It is also, more than 135 years after construction began and long after Gaudí’s death, quite visibly still a work in progress.
The London and Barcelona-based director David Cerqueiro’s film Stone Cut is a brief profile of the Japanese sculptor Etsuro Sotoo, who, for 40 years, has made finishing Gaudí’s would-be masterpiece his life’s work. Capturing the Sagrada Família with due splendour, the short documentary chronicles how, in committing to transform Barcelona’s once ‘abandoned ruin’ into its crown jewel, Sotoo felt called to stone, and even converted to Catholicism to better know the mind and inspiration of its original architect.
Director: David Cerqueiro
video
Social psychology
What happened when a crypto scam swept over a sleepy town in the Caucasus
18 minutes
video
Gender
A catchy tune explains the world’s ‘isms’ – according to your mum doing the laundry
5 minutes
video
Architecture
A 3D rendering of the Colosseum captures its architectural genius and symbolic power
17 minutes
video
Human rights and justice
Surreal, dazzling visuals form an Iranian expat’s tribute to defiance back home
10 minutes
video
Language and linguistics
Do button-pushing dogs have something new to say about language?
9 minutes
video
Art
When East met West in the images of an overlooked, original photographer
9 minutes
video
Values and beliefs
Why a single tree, uprooted in a typhoon, means so much to one man in Hanoi
7 minutes
video
Consciousness and altered states
‘I want me back’ – after a head injury, Nick struggles with his altered reality
7 minutes
video
Meaning and the good life
Why Orwell urged his readers to celebrate the spring, cynics be damned
11 minutes