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The French capital's swanky new art museum funded by LVMH chairman Bernard Arnault opens with exhibitions dedicated to the building's architect, Frank Gehry.
We were washed over with awe when we pulled up to the Fondation Louis Vuitton, the private art museum designed by Frank Gehry and commissioned by LVMH chairman Bernard Arnault.
While we had seen plenty of photos prior to our visit, the massive size of the Fondation caught us off guard. Close up, the iridescent glass facade is stunning with the vibrant green of the park in the background. From afar, the image of this extravagant glass ship in the middle of the greenery is an intriguing one.
A colossal building with 12 giant glass sails that cover blocks of galleries affectionately called ‘icebergs’, Gehry’s masterpiece sits prettily in the Bois de Boulogne at the Jardin d’acclimatation, France's oldest children's amusement park.
"It doesn't look finished"
Gehry – whose prominent buildings include the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao and the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles – sees the Fondation as unfinished, in a good way.
He says, “The idea of making a building that’s not static, that’s a work in progress; it doesn’t look finished purposefully. I think that invites people to interact with it over time.”
Gehry stresses that there’s nothing “precious” or “sacred” about the space, and waxes lyrical about changing the lights and filling it with plants instead so that the whole building would look like a plant, or enlarging children’s art and hanging it up to cover the building.
“I think the building is strong enough to not be threatened by it.”
Fondation Louis Vuitton, in numbers
Holding 11 art galleries with a 350-seater auditorium that will host fashion events and musical performances, it took 3,000 workers to construct the Fondation over five years.
It took two years to put together a team of over 100 engineers to create the technology for construction.
The glass sails are made from 3,600 unique glass panels shaped in a custom-built oven in Italy; no two panels are the same. And the icebergs? Made from 19,000 white sheets of fibre re-inforced concrete known as Ductal.
The building is on a 55-year occupancy agreement with the Paris city council and will be given to the French capital when the lease is up.
The Fondation Louis Vuitton will hold permanent collections of works belonging to the Fondation and Bernard Arnault, with temporary exhibitions twice a year.
Opening programme
The Fondation opens to the public on October 27th, 2014 after three special open days for the inaugural weekend from October 24th to 26th.
On October 28th, the auditorium will host a recital by pianist Lang Lang and from November 6th-14th, a series of eight retrospective concerts by Kraftwerk.
For the inauguration, museum director Suzanne Pagé has crafted a fitting programme that inspires dialogue and contemplation of the building’s architecture.
Below are some memorable highlights from our tour of the Fondation.
Frank Gehry (October 24, 2014 – March 16, 2015)
On the ground floor, an exhibition dedicated to Frank Gehry’s design process gives visitors a thorough look at how the project went from paper to park.
Framed original sketches hang on the walls, model pieces of the glass sails drape from the ceiling and videos of the Fondation project onto large screens.
It is here that you truly see the Fondation’s massive size from an aerial view and how Gehry has brilliantly succeeded in creating a sense of movement with his design. Transfixing scenes show the building sailing through lush treetops and the way the glass façade changes in appearance as the light hits.
This exhibition is presented in dialogue with the first major European retrospective of Frank Gehry’s work, organised simultaneously at the Centre Pompidou, which we also recommend visiting before heading to the Fondation.
For architecture enthusiasts and art fans alike (or those who are simply curious), it’s an excellent primer that charts the evolution of his designs from irregular, boxy shapes to utilising computational techniques and themes of fluidity and singularity.
Taryn Simon, ‘A Polite Fiction’, 2014
Taryn Simon’s ‘A Polite Fiction’ is an interesting focus on the 3,000 workers who built the Fondation. Items left behind, vandalised, and embedded underneath the soil during construction are given their own story.
It’s surprisingly uncensored, too. Quotes aren’t left out from workers who don’t agree with building the Fondation and its purpose, adding a raw sense of honesty that gives authentic soul to this exhibition.
Oliver Beer, ‘Composition for a New Museum’, 2014
Oliver Beer’s performance exhibition is also one of our favourites – he’s transformed Gallery 8 of the Fondation into a musical instrument.
Three opera singers use their voices to match the specific resonant frequencies of the empty room, crafting it musically and harmonically and resulting in a space that can be heard.
John Giorno, ‘Dial-A-Poem’
Curiosity at seeing these rotary telephones will be charmingly rewarded.
‘Dial-A-Poem’ was the first poetry phone service developed in 1968 where anyone could dial 212 628 0400 and hear a poem, read and recorded by various artists and poets.
We dialled a number and heard a poem about dimes, nickels and quarters that sounded like it was recorded in a dark, smoky coffeehouse in New York City. The phones are connected to 200 randomly activated pre-recorded poems; pick a number and let it surprise you.
Olafur Eliasson, ‘Inside the Horizon’, 2014
An unassuming installation that cleverly uses the space in the lower level (known as the grotto), Eliasson invites us to walk inside our own horizon, likening the feeling to be as "as closed as a grotto, as reflective as a mirror, and as ephemeral as light."
Head over to the Fondation Louis Vuitton official website for exhibition details and ticketing info.
The Fondation Louis Vuitton is located at 8, avenue du Mahatma Gandhi, 75116 Paris
(Photos: Fondation Louis Vuitton; Malaysia Tatler)
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