Information provided by Foster + Partners
To mark twenty years since the completion of the Carré d’Art in Nîmes, Norman Foster has been invited to curate a special exhibition to celebrate this anniversary – his design won an international competition for the project in 1984. The title of the exhibition is ‘Moving’ and it brings together 138 works by 66 artists from 14 countries, covering almost a 200 year period from Turner’s early nineteenth-century watercolours to contemporary video pieces.

The exhibition’s title relates to the theme of movement, both physical and spiritual – works of art that express motion, as encapsulated by Umberto Boccioni’s 1913 ‘Forme uniche della continuità nello spazio’, alongside Norman Foster’s personal selection of works that move him emotionally. New works have been specially commissioned for the show, including a sound installation by American artist Bill Fontana, a kinetic sculpture entitled ‘The Lost Compass’ by Olafur Eliasson, a monumental installation by Brazilian artist Nuno Ramos and a sequence of paintings by the German artist Daniel Lergon.

Many artists, individuals, institutions and galleries have lent works of art for ‘Moving’, including Tate London, Musée d’Art Moderne Saint-Étienne, Centre Pompidou, Paris, the Collection of Christopher Rothko and the Robert and Lisa Sainsbury Collection. The Foster family lives surrounded by art and the curatorial strategy echoes the domestic arrangement of these objects, juxtaposing works from different movements to reveal shared influences and invite new readings. There is a particular emphasis on Abstraction. Norman Foster has selected a number of pieces from the Carré d'Art collection, among which are paintings by Gerhard Richter and sculpture by Juan Munoz and an early work by Cristina Iglesias. For every work by an acknowledged master such as Rothko and Serra, there are several by younger and less well known talents. In a dialogue between art and architecture, the exhibition extends beyond the confines of the galleries into the entrance space and glass staircase at the heart of the building.

Norman Foster:
“It has to be a unique experience for an architect, wearing the hat of a collector, to adopt the totally new role of curator acting within the spaces of one’s own creation. The challenge is both daunting and truly exhilarating. Because I have no scholarly aspirations or pretensions on the subject of art, I am free to make any kind of choices or visual connections. At home, if we put an abstract by the young Berlin painter Daniel Lergon next to a sculpture by Alberto Giacometti, next to a portrait by Francis Picabia we do not have to offer an explanation to anyone. The same is true of this exhibition and the same rules apply – or perhaps I should say the same absence of rules. I hope the visitor will share the pleasure that so many of these artists give to me and my family.”

Director of the Carré d’Art, Jean-Marc Prevost:
“Whether sculptural or aural, the work will come into dialogue with the architecture but also with the history of the building. Concepts such as movement, speed, mass, fluidity, abstraction, figuration, space, immanence, transcendence, gravity, lightness and materiality form the strands of the Ariadne’s thread that runs through this exhibition.”

Photographs Credit Nigel Young_Foster + Partners

Artwork

Joseph ALBERS
1888, Bottrop (Germany) – 1976, New Haven (USA)
Josef Albers Museum, Bottrop (Germany) : www.bottrop.de
Albers Foundation : www.albersfoundation.org

Umberto BOCCIONI
1882, Reggio de Calabre (Italia) – 1916, Vérone - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Boccioni

Alexandre CALDER
1898, Philadelphia – 1976, New York - www.calder.org/

Alberto GIACOMETTI
1968, St Ampa (Switzerland) – 1966, Coire (Switzerland) - www.fondation-giacometti.fr

Andreas GURSKY
1955, Leipzig (germany). Lives and works in Düsseldorf
www.ateliergursky.de

Hans JOSEPHSOHN
1920, Königsberg, today Kaliningrad (Russia) – 2012, Zürich - www.hauserwirth.com

LOS CARPINTEROS
Collective founded in 1991 in Havana (Cuba). Live and work in Havana (Cuba) and Madrid (Spain).
Marco Antonio Castillo Valdés (Camaguey, Cuba, 1971) ; Dagoberto Rodríguez Sánchez (Caibarién, Las Villas, Cuba, 1969) & Alexandre Arrechea Jesus Zambrano (Trinidad, Las Villas, Cuba, 1970), until 2003 - www.loscarpinteros.net

Iñigo MANGLANO-OVALLE
1961, Madrid. Lives and works in Chicago - http://inigomanglano-ovalle.com/

Miguel Ángel RÍOS
1943, San Jose Norte Catamarca (Argentina). Lives and works in Mexico and New York

Mark ROTHKO
1903, Dvinsk (Lettonia) - 1970, New York

Michal ROVNER
1957, Tel-Aviv (Israel) - http://michalrovnerstudio.com/

Pierre SOULAGES
1919, Rodez (France). Lives and works in Sète and Paris - www.pierre-soulages.com/

Matias SPESCHA
1925, Trun (Switzerland) - 2008

Information provided by Luke Jensen

Epoch Winery
The inspiration for the product design is derived from the oak tree and is reflected throughout. From the representation of the age rings within a tree to the roots running down the bottle and finished off with a seed placed within the glass bubble at the bottom. The idea was to transform an everyday object such as rubber bands into something functional and beautiful.

Information provided by ETT

Library Entrance Level:
The Library is entered from the public park towards the north - the site's urban and public face. Additional emergency exits are provided at ground as well as at +2.40M level onto the ramp surface.

At the entrance, one can choose to access community facilities in the lower and upper levels from the Entrance Lobby as well as stockrooms [cloakrooms] and washrooms below, before entering the Library Check-out Lobby. This Check-out Lobby acts as a means of control for Library Administration.

This level provides access to the Library levels via an amphitheatre/staircase or via a set of cascading ramps suspended from the ceiling. The ramps also provide intermediate access to the Children's Library from a landing at +2.40M level.

The amphitheater/staircase acts as an event space for book-readings, etc. It also acts as a lounge allowing library patrons flexible means of use. It provides access to the Lower Level of General Collections which has the Circulation/Library Assistance Desk, Lounge, Copy and Book Search.

The Children's Library:
The Children's Library is conceived of as a landscape of three sections on various levels: a raked, Activity Centre with colour-glass enclosed 'rooms' on platforms atop this sloping floor - as well as an amphitheater/staircase that is part of the book-reading room; a two-level collections space that houses bookracks and other reference material along with informal and formal seating; a 'bridge' like digital data centre where children can access computers.
The raked Activity Centre floor becomes part of the outdoor landscape defining a new play space for the children of the community.

The General Collections Room:
Conceived of a as a terraced forested landscape, visually connected to the northern park, four levels are interconnected by ramps and stairs to offer flexible yet distinctly heterogeneous spaces for the library collections. In the layout as shown, the lowest level becomes the 'periodicals room' with upper terraces reserved for book-racks and study / casual reading and reference. Book-racks are arranged to maximize views and a sense of openness and vastness within a small building. Light will filter through the ceiling skylights over the clustered slender steel columns as well as the perforated side walls will amplify the sensation of being within a forest.

Community Meeting Hall and Terrace:
The Community Hall is conceived of as a volume that opens out to the city on the north and to the undulating terrace roof via a grassy amphitheater. The space is made flexible for events and exhibitions by dividing glass walls. The glass wall along the exterior patio can be opened up to the amphitheater to house a larger audience.
The terrace also connects to a publicly accessible ramp that climbs up the west facade.

ETT architecture | design | research
C602, Sun-and-Dew, Road No2, Kalina, Santacruz [E], Mumbai-400098, India
Project: 'Lights of the Valley Forest' - Public Library, Daegu
Year: 2012
Project Team: Dhara Mehta, Jude D'Souza, Sonali Praharaj, Suprio Bhattacharjee
All images courtesy ETT architecture | design | research

Information provided by Foster + Partners
The Museum’s historic buildings have been carefully restored and the exhibition spaces augmented by a spectacular new wing, which provides an ideal environment for viewing the magnificent ‘Blue Rider’ collection. As well as radically improving the buildings’ environmental performance, the remodelling has created a new entrance and social spaces, including a restaurant, terrace, education facilities and a dramatic full-height atrium, where the old is articulated within the new.

Built in 1891 as a studio and villa for the artist Franz von Lenbach, the Lenbachhaus Museum has been gradually extended over the last century. However, its buildings were in need of renewal and the museum lacked the facilities to cater to a growing audience of 280,000 people a year. Redefining circulation throughout the site, the project has transformed a complex sequence of spaces of different periods into a unified, legible museum that is accessible and open to all.

Peeling away the unnecessary historical accretions, a 1972 extension has been removed to reveal the wall of the original villa, which has been sympathetically restored in ochre render. The different historical elements are then unified along Richard-Wagner Street by a new gallery pavilion, containing two levels of exhibition space. The new building is intended as a ‘jewel box’ for the treasures of the gallery – it is clad in metal tubes of an alloy of copper and aluminium, their colour and form designed to complement the villa’s rich ochre hue and textured facades.

Inside the new building, a sequence of intimate galleries display the Museum’s internationally-renowned ‘Blue Rider’ collection of early twentieth-century Expressionist paintings, echoing the domestic scale of their original setting in the villa Lenbach. As many of the works of art were painted in ‘plein-air’, indirect natural light has been deliberately drawn into the upper level galleries to create the optimum environment for their display.

A new entrance has been created adjacent to the restaurant, accessed via a new landscaped piazza to the east of the museum – this move reclaims the courtyard garden, turning it from a pedestrian thoroughfare into a tranquil space for visitors. The restaurant is open outside of the Museum’s opening hours and its seating continues outside, helping to enliven the surrounding streets and attracting new visitors into the galleries.

The new social heart of the building is a dramatic top-lit atrium, with ticket and information desks, access to a new temporary exhibition space on the ground floor and a grand, cantilevered stair to the upper level galleries. Clearly articulating the old within the new, its impressive volume incorporates the ochre exterior wall of the original villa and is scaled to accommodate large-scale works of art. The Museum commissioned the artist Olafur Eliasson for a site specific work titled Wirbelwerk. During the day sunlight washes the white walls via a long, slender opening at roof level and horizontal louvres cast changing patterns of light and shade within the space.

As well as repairing the fabric of the existing buildings, one of the main aims of the project has been to radically improve the museum’s environmental performance. A water-based heating and cooling system within the floors has been implemented – using significantly less energy than an air based heating, this represents an innovative step in a gallery context. Rainwater is also collected and recycled and lighting has been replaced and upgraded with low-energy systems.

Facts and Figures

Lenbachhaus,
Munich, Germany
2002-2013

Client: City of Munich,
Cultural Department,
Building Construction

Appointment: 2002
Construction Start: 2009
Completion: 2013

Site Area: Approx. 4,000m²
Area (Gross): 12,328m²

Facilities:
More than 55 exhibition spaces and galleries with a range of lighting systems combining LED and natural light, atrium orientation hall, shop, restaurant/cafe, lecture hall, historic villa, administration, conservation workshop, adult and children’s education centre, cloakroom

Art Installations:
‘Wirbelwerk’ 2012 by Olafur Eliasson
‘Lenbachhaus’ 2012 by Thomas Demand

Structure:
Main structure new parts concrete and steel (roof of entrance hall) Old parts brick. Facade TECU (new parts) and render (old parts)

Energy:
Natural daylight use maximised in upper galleries and circulation spaces
LED lights in all public spaces
Heating and cooling integrated into the walls and floors
Use of natural ground water for cooling and heating
Use of rainwater for toilets

Lighting:
LED lights – first installation of LED lighting used extensively in an art museum. Fully controllable lighting with exceptionally wide range of settings in order to display works in optimum conditions. Energy efficient.

Materials:
External: TECU-Gold Aluminium/copper alloy
Internal: Timber floor
Bronze balustrades

Cost:
Project cost: 59 million Euros
LED Lighting: 4.3 million Euros

Photography Credit: Nigel Young_Foster + Partners
Visualization Credit: Foster + Partners
Find more Credits for the project here

Information provided by Giancarlo Zema Design Group

Canyon Collection
Inspired by the sculptures and infinite layers of the American Grand Canyon, this eco-friendly collection designed by architect Giancarlo Zema for the new Origami Furniture brand consists of a chair, coffee table and lamp made of recycled cardboard. Soft and curvaceous shapes reveal cozy niches to keep bags, magazines or small objects.

Snake Collection
A playful, cheerful and colorful snake with a curvy silhouette, almost like a cartoon. This is the exciting childhood memory that led designer Giancarlo Zema to design, for the new Origami Furniture brand, an essential but fun collection that consists of a desk and chair made of recycled dual-colored cardboard. An ideal piece of furniture to decorate smart and eco-friendly homes and offices in a young and informal style.