Good Morning Everyone!
TGIF!
The Arab Institute, Paris,
is a great museum just across the river from Notre Dame.
Designed by the French Architect, Jean Nouvel
“My wife and kids went to see this building in Paris when we were there a few years ago
and while it was a very interesting combination of architecture and engineering,
the maintenance program seemed to have a distinctly French relaxed attitude” -Eric Snellings
Address: 1 rue des Fossés St-Bernard, 5e Phone: 01-40-51-38-38
Metro: Jussieu
Hours: Tues-Sun 10am-6pm
Cost: Permanent exhibitions: 4€ adults, 3€ students, free for children under 12.
Temporary exhibits: 7€ adults, 5€ students, free for children under 12.
Perhaps best of all his works, Nouvel’s Arab World Institute most clearly and literally demonstrates the common thread through his works: skillful coaxing of light to enter and play in his buildings. The building’s south-facing façade is constructed entirely of mechanical oculi operated by photoelectric cells that automatically open and close in response to light levels. It also beckons images of latticework screens iconic to the Mid-East and as such reveals another common thread of Nouvel’s works: deferential reference to historic and physical surround.
This strong response to context means that Nouvel’s oeuvre does not impose the burden of a signature starchitect style on individual projects. “We, as a jury, recognize that architecture is a field of many challenges and complexities and that the career of an architect does not always follow a linear path,” noted the Pritzker jury in their release statement. “In the case of Jean Nouvel, we particularly admire the spirit of the journey—persistence, imagination, exuberance, and, above all, an insatiable urge for creative experimentation—qualities that are abundant in the work of the 2008 Pritzker Architecture Prize Laureate.”
In Nouvel’s own words: “My interest has always been in an architecture which reflects the modernity of our epoch as opposed to the rethinking of historical references. My work deals with what is happening now—our techniques and materials, what we are capable of doing today.”
