Luma Arles מגדל לומה בצרפת -אדריכל פרנק גרי || פרויקטים

Project name: Luma Arles
Location: Arles, France
LUMA FOUNDATION: Maja Hoffmann, Anna von Brühl, Sandra Roemermann, Bessie Zhu, Friedrich von Brühl
Architects: Gehry Partners [Frank Gehry]
Year: 2021
Area: 15831 m²
Photographs: Iwan Baan, Adrian Deweerdt, Victor Picon, Rémi Bénali
Curatorial team: Maja Hoffmann, Executive director, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Co-artistic director,Tom Eccles, Co-artistic director Vassilis Oikonomopoulos, Director of programmes and exhibitions Matthieu Humery, Exhibition curator Martin Guinard, Publications and conferences.
Opening times: from June 26 to September 26 2021.

מאז הקמתו בשנת 2013, פיקח LUMA Arles על הפיכתו של פארק דה אטליארס, אתר תעשייה לשעבר בן 27 דונם בארל, צרפת, כדי ליצור קמפוס יצירתי חדש המאגד אמנים וחדשני העתיד. המגדל, מרכז המשאבים לאמנויות בגודל 15,000 מ''ר, הוא המרכז של LUMA Arles זה יאכלס מתקני מחקר וארכיון, חדרי סדנאות וסמינרים, וכן חללי תצוגה. האלמנט המארגן המרכזי של הבניין החדש הוא תוף זכוכית עגול שֶׁלָה. הצורה מתייחסת לזירה הרומית . קנה המידה והגיאומטריה של התוף משקפת את השפעות התכנון הרומיות העתיקות שקבעו היזמים של ארל.


Photo Digital Square-LUMA Arles FOG 21-06 4365 Photograph Credit: IWANBAAN

The Romans used civic buildings to organize the densely situated buildings around it. The drum is both transparent and porous, with walls that open to the surrounding industrial buildings turning it into the central hub of the campus. The building grows out of the centre of the drum and is oriented towards the historic centre of Arles.
The skyline of Arles is populated with towers built from the ancient times to the Middle Ages up to the present. The new building will help establish LUMA Arles as a significant site among the other landmarks of the city. The image of The Tower takes its inspiration from the imestone peaks of the Alpilles the mountain range that rises from the Rhone Valley northeast of Arles. Upon the horizon of the region, the geological formations are a strong natural feature the jutting peaks stand in stark contrast to the plain of the valley from which they emerge. The impressive forms and textures of the jagged cliffs helped to establish a formal and contextual ambition for the new building


Photo Digital Square-1.©AtelierLuma Victor Picon


Photo Digital-210106-TOURLUMA-Photograph Credit:ADRIAN DEWEERDT


Photo Digital Square-210106-TOURLUMA Photograph Credit: ADRIAN DEWEERDT

The Alpilles have played a significant role in the cultural memory of the region and abroad. They figure prominently in Van Gogh’s paintings from the time he spent in Arles in which he depicted the mountains with visible, segmented strokes emphasizing the dynamism and texture of the terrain. The manner in which Van Gogh rendered the Alpilles influenced the development of the exterior cladding of The Tower. The design of the building seeks to capture the movement of discrete elements across a surface.

This manner of breaking down the surface to visible modules became an important theme in the surface development of the building as it reinforced the idea of a “painterly building.” The building changes in appearance as one moves around it, as each of the panels reflects light differently. Over the course of the day the building will take on the colours and hues of the surrounding context and sky, adding the impression of movement across the facades. Further reflection on the local architecture of Arles reinforces this concept; best exemplified in the masonry construction of the Roman and Romanesque architecture in the city, such as the limestone panels of the Amphitheatre, the Thermal Baths of Constantine, and the stone roof panels of the cloister of the Church Saint-Trophime. The texture and weight of these stone buildings serve as both reference and point of departure for the design of the new building. Rendered in Stainless steel, the building panels simultaneously reference the tradition of masonry construction of the region and the industrial heritage of its immediate site.

Photo Digital Square-LUMA Arles FOG 21-06 2548 Photograph Credit: IWAN BAAN

Photo Digital Square-1.©AtelierLuma Photograph Credit: VictorPicon

Atelier LUMA and Natural Materials
The convergence of languages, practices, know-how and disciplines is specifically represented in the use of natural materials which we have been developing with Atelier LUMA since 2016. In a number of different areas, the wall coverings made from algae, the salt panels in the lobbies on each floor, the sunflower pulp or the previously unseen mixture of concrete and salt, are a group of materials which have been conceived and developed using natural resources considered previously of no value and that have been gradually developed during the research carried out with the designers. Rirkrit Tiravanija worked with Atelier LUMA and the firm which produces the Aubusson Tapestries to design a room in which there is a cross-fertilisation of centuries-old techniques, using the wool coming from the Arles merino flocks and the natural dyes from the wild plants growing all over the Camargue that are usually burnt ,and which our research allowed to see in a different light.

Our unique environment blends indistinctly Architecture, Art, Nature and Design. It has become the showcase for presenting a programme of exhibitions and installations which are the prolongation, and at times also the instigation, for this organic approach.
These “Living Archives” are presented in the form of mini-exhibitions and run like a common thread right through, showing the elationships maintained for many years with the artists, the curators and the thinkers who have done me the honour of accompanying us, so as to put them at the disposal of the researchers and residencies which we organise for the artists, exhibition curators and authors. These archives, which have gradually become a collection and which I have acquired without really owning them.


Photo Digital Square-LUMA Arles FOG 21-06 5001 Photograph Credit: IWANBAAN



Photo Digital Square-LUMA Arles FOG 21-06 5469 Photograph Credit: IWANBAAN

Buildings, Archipelago and Living Organism
The organic development taking place in The Tower which links together multiple layers, is also at work in the Parc des Ateliers. I learned early on that it is in the connections between the different elements, which may at first have seemed scattered and distinct, that an important part of the project lies. The notion of archipelago, where the freedom and independence of the different areas are inherent,
takes on a different dimension as soon as the links between these elements are established and intensify. The buildings which were part of the industrial heritage and which, together with Annabelle Selldorf, we patiently renovated, were designed to take into account a diversity of typologies and conditions in the terrain which characterise them. In this way, it was possible to complement the quality of the various areas available in The Tower and to create the flexibility required to imagine activities on a huge variety of scales and in many formats. Just like the archipelago so dear to Édouard Glissant, each of the buildings and spaces can function independently or in combination with one another. The programmes that have been gradually initiated such as the artists’ and authors’ residencies, Atelier LUMA, the LUMA Days, the Living Archives, the exhibitions, The Library is on Fire, Offprint, the live performances, all come to life in the different areas, each one contributing to the activities of the others in order to enrich each proposal. This “archipelagic” and organic way of functioning of the programmes makes us become more like a living organism that swarms in the different spaces according to the various activities, without any prejudice regarding their formats.


Photo Digital-200515-TOURLUMA Photograph Credit:ADRIANDEWEERDT-01

Photo Digital-LUMA Arles FOG 21-05 1690 Photograph Credit: IWANBAAN



Luma_depliant_EN_20210702 © .luma.org