POMPIDOU CENTER designed by a Brit & an Italian
POMPIDOU CENTER designed by a Brit & an Italian
Hello Gary
Hello Gary
I just came across the following post from my ON THIS DAY Facebook list of posts from a year ago today.
Since then I have read your article where you mentioned that you and a couple colleagues entered that competition and came in 4th.
Congratulations on that competition.
1st general public lending library in all of France
History and Art Museum of France
and it was designed by a Brit and an Italian.
Hmmm?
In the 70s I applied for the Rome Prize a couple times and then the shorter Rome Prize for practicing architects plus a variety of design grants and special Washington internships that one of the Florida Senators supported me on.
Alas I didn't win or even place.
In 1977 I took myself on my own ROME PRIZE to do what I was planning on doing if I had actually won. The only differences...
a. I traveled for 110 days throughout 24 countries
b. never had housing or a studio in Rome that the Rome Prize included>
In 1982 I spent the Summer in Cortona teaching for the UGA Art Dept
completing my dream project.
Any way here is what I wrote about the Pompidou Center and some of my experiences. Since seeing it in 1977 twice I have returned each time I have been in Paris.
Didn't now that I knew one of the top winners. YOU!
In 1977 over the 4 days I was in Paris the first time around July 4th
several people told me to either
several people told me to either
a. must see the Pompidou Center it is great
b. don't waste you time it is ugly.
I arranged my last day to arrive before sundown and travel to it
via the Metro and saw it for the first time coming up from the Metro escalator at the base of the building.
via the Metro and saw it for the first time coming up from the Metro escalator at the base of the building.
I fell in love with this unique architectural design that used the various super structure system as the design elements and the building as purely open space enclosed by glass. I explored every inch of the building I could.
Finally I realized what time it was and ended up missing my reserved seat and sleeper car train to Madrid because I had spent so much time enjoying the Pompidou Centre.
Hear are some mixed responses to its design.
I photograph the surrounding area and Paris in the distance from every level of the building while I toured it.
The attached photo is the first time I have seen in from the air in its environment that it truly did contrast.
"Centre Pompidou’s bold “exoskeletal” architecture was thought to clash violently with the old houses surrounding it upon its opening in 1977. The public considered the cultural center’s aggressive industrialist style an attack on Paris’s historic fabric; one Parisienne, upon discovering that Richard Rogers was one of its architects (along with Renzo Piano), hit him on the head with her umbrella."
I learned during my second visit to Paris in September of 1977 that many of those who hated it, hated it because it was a cultural center for France and that was designed by a team of an Englishman and an Italian.
Here is a more supported response to it from current time.
Credit Charles Platiau/Reuters, via Corbis
VINCENT VAN DUYSEN
ON CENTRE POMPIDOU, PARIS
“I admire its boldness and openness as a building that participates with — and is woven into — its city, its place, its time. It was without any respect for the environment, a cultural factory where you could observe important modern art collections, a superexpressive, very colorful, complex building. It was seen as a rejection of the neighborhood, the Marais, and of Paris itself. Paris stands for French stone and light gray rooftops and beautiful natural colors, and all of a sudden you have got this architectural machine. On the other hand, the building has this democratic purpose because it attracts how many millions every year. I couldn’t take my eyes off it when I was studying architecture. It reversed the typical model of a museum into something that was engaging and inviting to the public. Architecture at that time needed to do things differently, like a shock. The shock liberates a lot of emotions and perceptions.”
ON CENTRE POMPIDOU, PARIS
“I admire its boldness and openness as a building that participates with — and is woven into — its city, its place, its time. It was without any respect for the environment, a cultural factory where you could observe important modern art collections, a superexpressive, very colorful, complex building. It was seen as a rejection of the neighborhood, the Marais, and of Paris itself. Paris stands for French stone and light gray rooftops and beautiful natural colors, and all of a sudden you have got this architectural machine. On the other hand, the building has this democratic purpose because it attracts how many millions every year. I couldn’t take my eyes off it when I was studying architecture. It reversed the typical model of a museum into something that was engaging and inviting to the public. Architecture at that time needed to do things differently, like a shock. The shock liberates a lot of emotions and perceptions.”
One French designer I met since compared the shock of this building in 1970s to when Nortre Dame was redesigned hundreds of years ago because it so drastically challenged the design of the buildings and environment it was placed in.
Alan
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