CTA Building, Vivid Sydney: A dreamy masterpiece for Martin Place

Harry Siedler’s divisive CTA Building has made a triumphant return as a part of Vivid Sydney’s Light Walk.
Ample Projects has designed a projection that tracks life, death and rebirth through stunning abstract imagery.
It’s a swift reminder of how fascinating the mushroom building is.
READ MORE: The ultimate guide to Vivid Sydney.

The bygone charms of Sydney’s iconic Harry Siedler-designed Commercial Travellers’ Association (CTA) building have been welcomed back into the fold for Vivid Sydney. For the first time since 2018, Martin Place has been activated as one of the five major zones included along the 8km Vivid Light Walk. And this divisive mushroom-shaped building is the centrepiece.

Sydney-based collective Ample Projects has once again come on board to create a projection for the iconic building, following their 2017 work Urban Tree 2.0, projected on the same building with a world of mushrooms and exotic creatures. This time, they’ve taken a much different, more abstract approach.

Nick Tory, Bonnie Forsyth, Julian Reinhold, Oliver Abbott and Alex Dray have put together BioDream, pitched as a “psychedelic dreamscape” that examines the liminal space which connects reality to the subconscious, aligning with Vivid Sydney 2025’s “dream” theme by unfolding fluid, surrealistic scenes of circling albatross, dripping water, and snaking mangroves that stretch their branches around the front of the building, making it appear like a giant tree.

*Surreal imagery of clouds, birds, suns and branches cover to CTA Building (photo: Destination NSW).*

It’s an “ode to the cycle of life” according to the creatives, once again playing with the natural world, but heightening it with the cycle of loss and rebirth written in such a way that adds imagination and magic to a thoroughfare known for its cold, brutal functionalism. Martin Place is always busy, but it rarely feels alive; well, not like this. And that’s really the beauty of Vivid’s seismic schtick, taking sections of Sydney and using them as canvases to stretch the imagination.

I’m really not sure why the CTA Building hasn’t been used as a Vivid mainstay for the past seven years (Covid considering). It’s perfect for the event’s entire conceit. On any given day, the building—famously hated by former NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet—is the most eccentric part of the least eccentric part of town, divisive but inspiring all the same. A giant mushroom, cloud-shaped thingy in the middle of a strip that, while architecturally varied, has had its soul sucked out by greedy bankers, politicians, and archaic ideas of “luxury.”

There’s been a concerted attempt to add more personality to Martin Place. To the point where it’s become one of the most exciting parts of Sydney, credited mostly to the development in and around the new Sydney Metro station. In just a matter of days, the station’s fascinating, tech’d-out Muru Giligu Tunnel will host a series of special dinners curated by none other than Queen of Mmeecro-wah-vay’ing stuff, Nigella Lawson.

*At one point, the CTA Building turns into a giant mangrove (photo: Destination NSW).*

And so seeing this projection on the CTA Building did what it’s supposed to do for Sydneysiders. It made me proud. We aren’t Rome, Chicago or New York City. But we have some wonderfully unique pieces of architecture that perfectly lend themselves to such a project. The way the birds circle the building before turning into clouds, making way for a rising sun. The way drops of water splish-splash into full-blown, fluid science experiments. It’s a mesmerising show that’s all to short, lasting only just a few minutes and playing on a continuous loop.

Although perhaps the brevity is a good thing. Once those birds disappear, you’ll want them to come back as soon as possible so you can snap a thousand photos.