Yoko Ono Wish Tree (C3A)

How to Participate

The interaction is beautifully simple. Paper and writing materials are available at the tree's base. Visitors write whatever they wish for — peace being the named theme, but any personal hope is welcome — then fold or attach it to a branch. The canopy gradually fills with hundreds of tiny paper messages rustling in the breeze alongside the silvery-green olive leaves. It is a participatory artwork in the truest sense: it literally does not exist without the people who come to it.↗↗

The wishes collected from the Córdoba tree are sent to Yoko Ono's studio and become part of the Imagine Peace Tower, a beam of light that rises from a wishing well on Viðey island in Reykjavik, Iceland — the memorial Ono created in memory of John Lennon. Every paper you hang here has the potential to join a global constellation of hopes.↗↗

The Wider Yoko Ono Installation at C3A

The Wish Tree does not stand alone. In December 2017, Yoko Ono sent three works specifically for Córdoba, making this the first time her art appeared in Andalusia. All three were installed for a three-year period and remain part of the C3A experience. The Wish Tree greets visitors at the entrance; inside, the other two pieces reward further exploration.↗↗

To See the Sky (Córdoba Version) is a steel spiral staircase painted in a gradient from light blue at its base to white at the summit. Installed beneath one of C3A's skylights, it invites visitors to climb barefoot and look up into the translucent light above — a physical ascent toward an image of the sky that Ono has carried in her consciousness since leaving Japan. The colour sequence was adapted specifically for the Córdoba installation, with previous versions in New York and Beijing.↗↗↗

Mend Piece in Four Seasons is a participatory work from Ono's series begun in 1966, evoking the Japanese tradition of kintsugi — repairing broken ceramics with gold. Here visitors are invited to mend garments: they can use items at the centre or bring damaged clothing of their own, repair it, and then keep it, swap it, or donate it to people in need. The piece turns slow handwork into an act of care.↗↗

The C3A Building

The Wish Tree stands at the entrance of one of Spain's most striking contemporary art venues. Designed by architects Fuensanta Nieto and Enrique Sobejano, the building is a Brutalist composition organised around hexagonal geometry drawn from the lattice patterns of Córdoba's Great Mosque-Cathedral. The structure sits on the south bank of the Guadalquivir, directly opposite the historic old town, so its river-facing media façade — a 100-metre wall of 1,319 concrete hexagonal cells fitted with LED lights — reflects back across the water at night.↗↗↗

Inside, the galleries are conceived without hierarchy: bare concrete slabs flow into artist studios and workshops, connected by a long communal corridor. The building opened to the public in December 2016 after a project originally tied to Córdoba's bid for European Capital of Culture.↗↗

Planning Your Visit

The Wish Tree is accessible during C3A's opening hours: Tuesday through Saturday 11:00–20:00, Sunday 11:00–15:00, closed Mondays. The entrance is wheelchair accessible. Even if you skip the galleries inside, the tree and its interactive message can be experienced in a few minutes — though most visitors find themselves lingering to read others' wishes, which range from the universal to the achingly personal.↗↗

A rewarding visit combines the wish-hanging moment with C3A's changing exhibitions and, if timed to dusk, the illuminated media façade viewed from the riverbank — the city's historical skyline glowing across the water while the building performs its nightly light transformation.↗

Travellers describe the experience in terms rarely applied to a tree: "crazy energy," "a must see," "we wished we could have visited it longer." The installation turns a brief stop into something unexpectedly meditative.↗