Philharmonie de Paris par Jean Nouvel

Un auditorium symphonique de 2 400 places, un pôle pédagogique pour les professionnels de la musique et les étudiants, une bibliothèque, des espaces consacrées à des expositions et des commerces : voilà en substance l’ensemble des activités qui composeront la Philharmonie de Paris, qui devrait ouvrir ses portes en 2012 dans le Parc de la Villette (XIXème arrondissement).

Ce projet ambitieux coûtera 200 millions d’euros et sera réalisé par l'architecte Jean Nouvel, lauréat du concours pour réaliser l'auditorium.

Il a présenté le 12 avril son projet de bâtiment en forme de colline constituée de plans superposés gris, «en harmonie» avec le parc de la Villette environnant. Selon l'AFP, le futur auditorium, qui doit ouvrir ses portes en octobre 2012, a été pensé «comme une butte» de 36 mètres de haut, sur laquelle on peut monter, a indiqué Nouvel.


Cette «colline» est constituée de superpositions de plans obliques en pavés de fonte d'aluminium gris. A l'intérieur, la salle de concert de 2400 places, modulable en fonction des musiques présentées (symphonique d'abord, mais aussi jazz ou musiques du monde) sera de conception «enveloppante», a-t-il dit.

La construction sera financée à par l'Etat (45%), la ville de Paris (45%) et la la Région Ile-de-France (10%). Le chantier doit démarrer en septembre 2009 pour ouverture de l'auditorium en octobre 2012.

(sources: Abeilleinfo, RFI, France2 )

Abu Dhabi stunning development projects

As discussed in the previous post, "The Louvre in the Desert", Abu Dhabi plans to build a $27 billion tourist and cultural development on Saadiyat Island, opposite the city. The project includes:

- Guggenheim Abu Dhabi,

- maritime museum

- performing arts center,

- Louvre Abu Dhabi.

The first tourist attractions will be available for viewing in 2012, and the entire project is scheduled for completion in 2018. Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan has commissioned no less than four of the world's most famous architects to create what promises to become one of the world's most important cultural destinations: Frank O. Gehry, Jean Nouvel, Tadao Ando and Zaha Hadid.

1) Abu Dhabi Guggenheim

With its spectacular architecture of compressed and intricately interconnected cuboids, prisms, cones and cylinders, and with a total area of almost 30,000 square meters (323,000 square feet), the Abu Dhabi Guggenheim will probably far outshine its New York City predecessor. Gehry is satisfied: "Approaching the design of the museum for Abu Dhabi made it possible to consider options for design of a building that would not be possible in the United States or in Europe," he says, adding that, "It was clear from the beginning that this had to be a new invention."

2) Performing Arts Center
Fifty-seven-year-old Iraqi architect Zaha Hadid, who lives in London, also has bombastic plans. Her Performing Arts Center, a building complex 62 meters (203 feet) tall, will include two concert halls, an opera and two theaters. The total number of seats will be 6,300 -- about as many as the Lincoln Center in New York has. Like the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, the theater complex will also offer spectacular views of the Persian Gulf and the skyline of the city.

3) Maritime Museum
Tadao Ando's Maritime Museum promises to be another highlight. Born in 1941, the minimalist architect is known for his austere style, which combines the Japanese Zen tradition with the modernist penchant for bare concrete. Inspired by dhows, the traditional sailing vessels of Arab merchants, Ando has designed a fragile-looking building in the shape of an abstract sail curved by the wind. Embedded in an oasis-like natural scenario dominated by a subterranean aquarium, Ando's restrained architecture promises to become a popular haven of contemplative peace within the planned architectural overkill.

The so-called Biennale Park, another development project planned for Saadiyat Island, openly acknowledges its Venetian inspiration with 19 pavilions designed by 19 younger architects. Hani Rashid is one of them. He's an Egyptian architect who lives in New York and is considered one of the most important contemporary architectural theorists. The park will be criss-crossed by a 1.5 kilometer (0.9 mile) navigable canal. As the country with the highest per capita income in the world, the United Arab Emirates certainly have no inhibitions about competing with the traditional cultural capitals of the world.

Of course, all these cultural highlights also require a tourist infrastructure that can cope with the masses of people expected to arrive from all over the world. Two 10-lane highways will connect Saadayat Island to the city and the airport. The completion of 29 hotels -- including a seven-star luxury hotel that is presumably Abu Dhabi's reply to to the legendary Burj Al Arab in Dubai -- is planned for 2018. There will also be a marina for cruise ships and moneyed yacht-owners, expected to provide mooring for about 1,000 vessels.

Saadayat Island promises to far outdo Las Vegas and Bilbao -- the traditional red rags for cultural pessimists and critics of tourism -- in terms of its capacity to provoke. And yet many culture fans may end up in Abu Dhabi sooner or later -- whether to admire the city or just to rant.

Source: Spiegel Intl

The Louvre in the Desert

$520 million, that is the amount that Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates, agreed to pay to attach the Louvre’s name to a museum that it hopes to open in 2012. And there is more: in exchange for art loans, special exhibitions and management advice, Abu Dhabi will pay France an additional $747 million.

For Abu Dhabi, the deal is an important step in its plan to build a $27 billion tourist and cultural development on Saadiyat Island, opposite the city. The project’s cultural components include a Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, a maritime museum and a performing arts center as well as the Louvre Abu Dhabi.

The Louvre Abu Dhabi, designed by the French architect Jean Nouvel as a 260,000-square-foot complex covered by a flying-saucer-like roof, is expected to cost around $108 million to build. Planned as a universal museum, it will include art from all eras and regions, including Islamic art.Jean Nouvel is not planning to build a single gargantuan building, but rather a "microcity" -- a cluster-like collection of differently sized building types directly by the sea. The ensemble will be dominated by a great, light-flooded dome, conceived of as a symbolic link between world cultures.The dome is "made of a web of different patterns interlaced into a translucent ceiling which lets a diffuse, magical light come through in the best tradition of great Arabian architecture," Nouvel says. That he, of all people, was commissioned to design this building was kept secret until the last moment. Nouvel already crafted an architectural bond between the East and the West 20 years ago, in the form of the Institut du Monde Arabe (1981-1987) in Paris.

The project will be overseen by a new International Agency for French Museums that is to include the Musée d’Orsay, the Georges Pompidou Center, the Musée Guimet, the Château de Versailles, the Musée Rodin, the Musée du Quai Branly and the Louvre among its members.
Apart from paying $520 million to the French agency for the use of the Louvre name for 30 years, with $195 million to be paid within one month, Abu Dhabi has also agreed to make a direct donation of $32.5 million to the Louvre to refurbish a wing of the Pavillon de Flore for the display of international art.

This gallery, to be ready by 2010, will carry the name of Sheik Zayed bin Sultan al-Nahayan, the founder and longtime ruler of the United Arab Emirates, who died in 2004.
Abu Dhabi will also finance a new Abu Dhabi art research center in France and pay for restoration of the Château de Fontainebleau’s theater, which will be named after Sheik Khalifa bin Zayed al-Nahayan, the current president.

For a government-owned cultural institution in France to carry the name of a corporate or foreign donor is also a first and may well raise eyebrows here. In the past, for instance, the Louvre has turned down offers of financial help from philanthropists who asked that galleries be named after them in return.

Critics of the plan accused France of “selling its soul”, but the decision was made by the French government. It owns most major French museums and, by all accounts, President Jacques Chirac has concluded that this is one global market where France can compete effectively. On matters of state, the Louvre’s opinion, reportedly unenthusiastic in this case, carries little weight.

The first shot of criticism was fired last month by three leading lights of the French art world — including Françoise Cachin, a former director of French museums — who complained loudly not only about the Abu Dhabi project, but also about the Louvre’s current three-year loan agreement with the High Museum in Atlanta and a plan for the Georges Pompidou Center to open an annex in Shanghai.Their protest that France was “selling” its museums, chiefly by renting rather than lending artworks, prompted an Internet site (http://www.latribunedelart.com/) to organize the petition endorsing their position. Among those who have signed are numerous current and former directors and curators of leading museums, including the Musée de l’Orangerie, the Musée d’Orsay, the Pompidou and even the Louvre.

One rumor circulating here this week was that Abu Dhabi had refused to display nudes or religious paintings, both pillars of Western art. But according to Le Monde, the draft agreement stated that the new museum could not reject artworks for “unreasonable motives.” Francine Mariani-Ducray, the current director of French museums, also denied that Abu Dhabi had placed restrictions on art lent by France.

Source: The NY Times Art, Spiegel Online Intl