SOM journal 2 presents recent work by one of the world's largest and most influential design firms, in the context of a critical discussion among some of the profession's leading thinkers. Commentaries by artist James Turrell, architects Tod Williams and Douglas Garofalo, engineer Werner Sobek, and architect and critic Wilfried Wang give a frank review of the firm's current work. The projects featured are the Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center; The Central Plant at the University of California at Merced; The China World Trade Center in Beijing, China; The Greenwich Academy Upper School; The Deerfield Academy of Science, Math & Technology Center; Elementary School Number 11 in Fairfield, Connecticut; The Jordan House in Bellas, Portugal; the People Mover Station at Dulles Airport in Washington, D.C., and the Washington Monument Visitors Center in Washington, D.C. The volume includes an interview by Detlef Mertins with former SOM partner Bruce Graham, designer of the John Hancock Tower in Chicago and an influential figure in the firm's history.For more than fifty years, JAMES TURRELL (*1943, Los Angeles), one of the most prominent artists of our time, has devoted himself to the exploration of the (im)materiality and perception of light. Turrell succeeds like no other artist in making it possible to experience light as an artistic medium through the senses and the intellect alike. He himself describes his art as “perceptual art.” In his large installations the artist floods accessible spaces with light, which spills out in soft seas of color or intensely glowing, luminous fogs, taking viewers to the limits of their perception. This book provides a comprehensive view of Turrell’s oeuvre and unites works of art from various phases of his career from the 1960s onward.