Louvre Abu Dhabi Museum
Louvre Abu Dhabi, ©www.popcinema.orgDOCUMENT ON HUMAN FRATERNITY
In February 2019, Pope Francis visited – for the first time of a Pope - the United Arab Emirates. On 4 February, together with the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar, Ahmad Al-Tayyeb, they released a joint statement: Document on Human Fraternity. It is a long text. It amplifies the determination of dialogue between Catholics and Muslims, starting from an indeterminate, almost syncretic God.
The Document wishes to initiate a perpetual communication, to have universal and reciprocal knowledge:
In the name of God and of everything stated thus far; Al-Azhar al-Sharif and the Muslims of the East and West, together with the Catholic Church and the Catholics of the East and West, declare the adoption of a culture of dialogue as the path; mutual cooperation as the code of conduct; reciprocal understanding as the method and standard. (1)
It formulates two relevant principles. The first is the safeguarding of places of worship as the centre of prayer and faith:
“The protection of places of worship – synagogues, churches and mosques – is a duty guaranteed by religions, human values, laws and international agreements. Every attempt to attack places of worship or threaten them by violent assaults, bombings or destruction, is a deviation from the teachings of religions as well as a clear violation of international law.” (1)
The second one recognizes a historical problem that has existed since the Trojan era. West and East should exchange civilizing elements to avoid conflicts:
“Good relations between East and West are indisputably necessary for both. They must not be neglected, so that each can be enriched by the other’s culture through fruitful exchange and dialogue. The West can discover in the East remedies for those spiritual and religious maladies that are caused by a prevailing materialism. And the East can find in the West many elements that can help free it from weakness, division, conflict and scientific, technical and cultural decline.” (1)
No less, the Document details which topics to learn from each other, and how to relate. The West should import spirituality, the East should acquire institutional, technical, and scientific concepts.
http://www.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/travels/2019/outside/documents/papa-francesco_20190204_documento-fratellanza-umana.html
LOUVRE ABU DHABI MUSEUM
These theories have had an avant-garde two years earlier.
On 11 November 2017, the Louvre Abu Dhabi Museum was inaugurated. Culturally, it is an important signal from Arab society, which wants to share the artistic tradition.
In the hall of religions - "The Universal Religions" – peacefully, there are, medieval crucifixes, crosses engraved from the sixth to the eighth century in remote monasteries in the Middle East, statues of the Virgin Mary, Hindu statues of Shiva, Bodhisattvas, stupas, Islamic decorations, many Buddha images. In a beautiful dark hall, in a large case, there are ancient Bibles, Koran, Torah, Buddhist and Taoist manuscripts.
It is the primary meaning of the new, harmonious Louvre Abu Dhabi. It is a bridge between West and East, as a means of smoothing out differences. Who better than the culture can raise these principles? First is the name. The largest, the most immense and perhaps the most arrogant museum in the world, the Louvre, is united with the fascinating and fantastic Far East.
THE MUSEUM
Why can a museum express this desire better than other forms of dissemination?
Museums are born at the same time as the bourgeoisie, with modern society:
“It is a phenomenon of our present civilization that art is localized in environments exclusively reserved for them. The museum is a creation of modern society, and sociologically corresponds to the rule of the bourgeois class.” (2)
The middle class takes advantage. The artworks must be defended. The previous shelters are victims of looting and theft: the churches, the aristocracy, the palaces are no longer secure site. If had not been found a solution, there would have been destruction and dispersion of art history. The salvation location has been the museum, a huge space where to accumulate and mostly protect artworks. Besides, the new vibrant social class wants to learn all the antecedent civilization:
“... for art: it has been located in specialized environments and these were museums ... "but immediately born a negative element:" but it has a flaw: it isolates the artwork from community.” (2)
Why build an expensive museum in a desert area? Definitely not for an educational function. A public and propaganda benefit prevails. This is the purpose of the Louvre Abu Dhabi, which is a wonderful box of precious pearls.
Another argument is the economic one:
“... under the exclusive influence of the commercial view of the bourgeois class, the work of art has essentially become a commercial object.” (2)
However, the two factors, political and economic, can easily coincide.
2. Arte e inconscio collettivo nell'età del museo di René Huyghe Il luogo dell'arte oggi di Clement Greenberg, Jaca Book, 1988, Milan, first edition 1988. Translated by the author
THE ACCORD
Composition with Blue, Red, Yellow and Black, Pier Mondrian, ©www.popcinema.orgThe predominant economic and political presence is confirmed in the stratospheric numbers.
The agreement between France and Abu Dhabi was reached in 2007. The richest of the Emirates pays 400 million euros to exploit, for thirty years, the most famous cultural brand in the world: Louvre. Besides, there is the know-how for the management of the museum, the expertise and the loans of paintings and sculptures. Totally, the contract provides for the payment of 974 million euros. (3)
Besides, there are direct purchases of artworks. The Louvre Abu Dhabi has bought about six hundred pieces, such as Piet Mondrian's canvas, Composition with Blue, Red, Yellow, and Black, paid for at an auction by Christie's $ 27.9 million. (3)
3..https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/07/arts/design/louvre-abu-dhabi.html
ARCHITECTURE
The island of Saadiyat (translation: island of happiness) was chosen for the museum. An island uninhabited and unproductive, outside the city. The idea is sumptuous; to transform this arid area into a boundless world artistic centre. Along with the Louvre Abu Dhabi are also expecting the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, the Zayed National Museum and the Performing Arts Centre. Now the Louvre is finished and operative.
The architect is the starchitect Jean Nouvel. The cost is one hundred and eight million dollars. (4)
The result is a monument of 24,000 square meters (5), with fifty-five white buildings and twenty-three halls. (6)
A majestic work, built by one of the best creators of our time.
JEAN NOUVEL
Louvre Abu Dhabi ©www.popcinema.orgJean Nouvel was born in Fumel in France in 1945. In 2000, he received the Golden Lion at the Venice International Architecture Exhibition.
He defines himself, repeating it like a mantra: “I am a contextual architect” (5). The architect's artistic soul should not overflow into an exaggerated self-referentiality. Architectural art should be channelled into the total vision of the environment. Considering the traditional and historical perspective of habitat. His performances are artworks because they are located in that specific. Based elsewhere, they would not have the same seduction. It is the contextual Jean Nouvel.
Among his buildings, there is the Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris, built in 1987. It has the nearest links with the Louvre Abu Dhabi. The intellectual inspiration was the moucharabiehs. They are the grates, usually made of wood, with small openings which form textures. In the Arab apartments, the moucharabiehs closes the terraces. This original structure enriched the physical well-being of homes. In fact, it has two effects. It stylizes the light of the sun penetrated by holes, causing delightful lighting effects. The second is to moderate the degree of heat with air control. Besides, it, simultaneously, makes life in the house discreet and invisible but it does not obstruct peeking into the outdoors.
Nouvel built gigantic moucharabiehs surrounding the entire building. Inside the Institute, there is an exciting spectacle of rays, of lights. They change to create an ideal habitat; brightness and darkness coexist, producing livable human spaces for every weather. It is the demonstration of Nouvel's contextualism, he describes his masterpiece:
“The Arab Word Institute is a play on geometry and light. … You can not talk about this architecture without talking about geometry and light. … The South facade of the Arab Word Institute was already a filter that branded the whole building by light and geometry.” (7)
Jean Nouvel uses the same criterion in the construction of the Louvre. He captures the atmosphere of the territory, allowing his artistic talent to design an adequate and universally ordered museum.
Nouvel describes the initial encounter with the desolate island:
"I first visited the area by helicopter in 2006 as soon as I got the job. The island was completely deserted and apparently inhospitable. Despite that, I knew I wanted to build something that was completely assimilated in that territory. In fact, I am a contextual architect and I cannot imagine an architecture that is not deeply linked to the place where it were born ". (8)
It is a difficult job, impossible for any skilled architect, but not for a genius.
Nouvel himself admits it. In the hands of a weak and selfish architect, the result would have been“catastrophic”:
“It can be catastrophic when buildings are parachuted in by international offices, without any roots in a place”. (9)
It is not enough to study the present and the past, the architect must read in the scheduled development. The future of Saadiyat is to be a cultural centre. Other museums will have to be built near the Louvre. From the preparatory sketches, the Guggenheim by Frank Gehry reveals a horizontal orgy of galleries, cubes, edges.
The same euphoria is with the Zayed National Museum, Abu Dhabi by architect Norman Foster. The buildings point directly to infinity, simulating the flight of hawks.
Both, want to reach about eighty meters in height. (10)
Therefore, this land will be full of massive buildings tending towards the sky.
Nouvel understands and follows the Arab historical cornerstones. The houses, the palm groves, the warm and sunny light, the white, the water, the sea, the sky, the sand, the sun, the roofs of the souks, the medinas, the leaves of palm trees.
The dome is a primary basis of Islamic architecture. Nouvel models it, using innovative and evolved concepts and criteria.
THE DOME
Louvre Abu Dhabi ©www.popcinema.orgThe museum is a series of imposing white buildings joined by cool corridors.
The fifty-five complexes are completely covered by a mammoth dome. It is a dominant, authoritarian covering, heavy with 7,500 tons, equal to the Eiffel Tower. (11) It could appear an oppressive and burdensome object. In reality, the vault is perforated and consents the light to filter through, even here like a moucharabiehs, mitigating the external temperature, making it pleasant during the sultry season. It is an oasis, it allows peace and refreshment in the desert. The dome has a weave similar to a nest, the 7,850 (12) unique aluminium stars openings, cause an entertainment of brightness, with a relaxing shade. From above the reflections seem to bounce off the floor or from the walls. They are rays, they wet the white marble. The result is an entire penumbra.
The future includes grandiose museums, horizontal and oriented in the sky. On the contrary, Nouvel chooses the vertical extension. The Louvre dome flattens, sliding over the Gulf. The height from the ground is just thirty-six meters (13), related to Arab houses.
Louvre Abu Dhabi ©www.popcinema.orgThe cover is utopian, it enters the water, it is a spectacular suspension between the white light and the sun. The sea sneaks in. In fact, for any need, there is even a lifeguard for the most reckless visitors.
Observing the configuration of the dome is an irrational activity. It is not understood how the levels of metal are intellectually positioned to permit the entrance of light.
From outside, the sea, the museum and the sky, seem trapped by the dome, which has apparently landed on the water.
Today's defect is incompleteness. The Louvre is concluded while around is just empty. Therefore, the arrival is astonished by the visual power of the museum but near everything is depopulated. There are, large parking, some palm trees planted quickly, a very long walkway to enter. Probably, the expansion of the area has some stops in the various financial crises. Probably, other commercials, residential and hotel establishments will emerge when the planned museum institutions are finished.
11. https://www.louvreabudhabi.ae/en/about-us/architecture
THE DIRECTOR
Jacques Louis David, Napoleon Bonaparte, I Consul Crossing the Alps on 20 May 1800 ©www.popcinema.orgThe accord with France also covers the know-how for the management of the museum. The Scientific Directorof the Louvre Abu Dhabi is Jean François Charnier.
He conceives some interesting hypotheses. The museum must have an aesthetic and non-explanatory content:
“The Louvre Abu Dhabi is not a place where we explain things.” (14)
Consequently, he realizes it like a book with twelve chapters, the twelve halls of the Louvre Abu Dhabi.
The director carries out a cultural revolution for the museum itinerary.
Portrait of a Woman, Called La Belle Ferronnière, Leonardo ©www.popcinema.orgHe does not follow the typical geographical classification. Therefore, no Egyptian, Italian, Dutch, French halls; obligatory walk in the main museums. Jean-Francois Charmer suggests a circuit on the epochs. He organizes artworks from different regions in the same hall as long as they are from the equivalent period. Cerebral thinking must be expanded. Thought must compare very distant, historically divergent art. The spectator should not seek explanations but only questions.
It is an alternative way to think about art. This type of visit can astound, disconcert, disorient. Looking at Caravaggio, Raffaello, Tiziano, Mantegna, Leonardo is a unique, diversified reflection but, all in all, with a similar and even mentally calming style. In the Louvre Abu Dhabi, Belle Ferronnière by Leonardo is in the same hall with Turkish and Chinese ceramics, paintings by the Dutch Dirck Van Delen. It requests a livelier and wiser attitude.
14. https://www.artnews.com/art-news/news/first-look-inside-louvre-abu-dhabi-9285/
THE TWELVE HALLS
Louvre Abu Dhabi, ©www.popcinema.orgThe twelve halls are a history book, page after page, until the conclusion, the page of globalization, awaiting future proposals:
The First Village
The First Great Powers
Civilisations and Empires
The Universal Religions
The Asia Trade Routes
From the Mediterranean to the Atlantic
The World in Perspective
At the Court of the Prince
A New Art of Living
A Modern Word?
Modernity in Question
A Global Scene
It starts with Christ, Egypt, Greece, the Maya, Guatemala, Buddha, Socrates, Alexander the Great. Following the epochal rule, the finds of imperial Rome are together the Han Empire and the Teotihuacan Empire ones. At first sight, the comparison is not balanced. In reality, the Louvre Abu Dhabi forces using brains and hearts. Appears that Rome, China and Mexico may have similar artistic conceptions.
All the halls have masterpieces, special artworks, sophisticated opinions.
It is difficult to choose which ones linger in front.
WORKART
FIGHT BETWEEN CREUGAS AND DAMOXENOUS, ANTONIO CANOVA
Fight Between Creugas and Damoxenous, Antonio Canova ©www.popcinema.orgFight Between Creugas and Damoxenous by Antonio Canova, is a solemn artwork like only the neoclassical sculptor could have realized. They are two authoritative marble statues. They look triumphal, they stand in front of a high black marble platform with white streaks. Therefore, the gaze from below makes the figures of giants.
Creugas and Damoxenous are boxers of the games of Ancient Greece. Their match ended in a draw. A playoff was called. A single punch to decide the winner. Damoxenous behaves like infamous. He protects the chest with one arm and with the other, cowardly, stabs his rival, with such violence that his intestines come out.
A tragic story, sport can be hatred when it is a mere physical success and not an enhancement of personal growth. Canova represents them as vigorous men in a challenging position. Creugas has his left arm up, and he is preparing to strike. Damoxenous has one leg forward, his left covers his chest; his right hand is on his side pointed to his rival to inflict the killing blow. They complement each other. The sculptors show the moment before death. The rivals scrutinize each other, the muscles are tense. The faces have strong and determinate jaws. It is a jewel of neoclassicism; the two boxers are an example of alluring male bodies which reach the peak of art.
YOUNG EMIR STUDYING, OSMAN HAMDY BEY
Osman Hamdy Bey, Young Emir Studying, ©www.popcinema.orgOsman Hamdy Bey (1842-1910) is a Turkish artist trained in Paris. His importance is to disavow the most obvious Middle Eastern depictions: the erotic scenes of harems and hammams. Osman Hamdy Bey returns value to Islamic dynamism:
“... depict a different, rational and dynamic orient, where people, including women, stand upright, read, debate ... they depict a progressive Muslim society engaged in the pursuit of knowledge, science, and progress.” (15)
The Louvre Abu Dhabi exhibits Young Emir Studying, painted in 1878. It is an example of modernity and skill. It is canvas oil. In the picture, there is the entire Muslim culture. A young emir concentrated on his studies. He is lying prone on a fancy carpet. The book is on an exquisite cushion. He wears a light green dress, closed by a green tone on tone belt, his head is adorned with a beautiful turban. The boy is barefoot, one hand supports his chin, with the other he follows the reading. His gaze is low, absorbed in the volume. The painting is an attractive and splendid figure of an adolescent. The room is perfect, it is the exact iconography of a wealthy intelligent modern emir. The sidewall is of blue ceramic, above an inscription, the verse of the Koran 11,88:
"And my guidance cannot come except from Allah",
interrupted by an elegant recess in the wall in the shape of a head, used as a bookcase.
It is Arabian excellence, with a refined execution, attention to every detail. The image is the union between West and East.
15. Sibel Bozdogan, Modernism and Nation Building: Turkish Architectural Culture in the Early Republic, University of Washington Press; New edition May 1, 2002
FOUNTAIN OF LIGHT, AI WEIWEI
Al Weiwei, Fountain of Light, ©www.popcinema.orgSura 24; 35 of the Koran is the verse of light:
Allah is the Light of the heavens and the earth. His light1 is like a niche in which there is a lamp, the lamp is in a crystal, the crystal is like a shining star, lit from ˹the oil of˺ a blessed olive tree, ˹located˺ neither to the east nor the west,2 whose oil would almost glow, even without being touched by fire. Light upon light! Allah guides whoever He wills to His light. And Allah sets forth parables for humanity. For Allah has ˹perfect˺ knowledge of all things.
The Fountain of Light by the versatile Chinese author Ai Wei Wei is a crystal lamp shining like a brilliant star. Made by glass and steel, Ai Wei Wei composes a tower of light in height. Therefore, this colossal lantern twists, wraps around itself. It looks like a tower of Babel, tends towards paradise, the quality of a spiritual source. Some interpretations assert a quoting in the project of the Russian artist Vladimir Tatlin for the construction of a Monument to the Third International. (16) The Fountain of Light is located in the last hall of the museum, it is the best culmination of the itinerary, due to its format and content.
LOUVRE ABU DHABI
Louvre Abu Dhabi ©www.popcinema.orgThe Louvre Abu Dhabi does not have that dusty, decadent patina of an immense past, matured over centuries of events. Such as the Parisian Louvre with its French grandeur, the Hermitage with the tsars and their aristocratic St. Petersburg, the Vatican museums with a history of Christianity that has survived over two thousand years.
In these places, beauty crushes, diminishing, the viewer. The relationship is unequal. The viewer, in front of the nobility of Michelangelo's Pietà or Leonardo's Mona Lisa, is pygmy. The feeling of inferiority does not exist in the Louvre in Abu Dhabi. Everything is prestigious, they exhibit masterpieces but acquire a human dimension.
Having few artworks in each hall promotes relaxation. Following the logical thread by epochs, with the juxtaposition among divergent cultures, requires concentration and focus. Soft light helps meditation.
Attitudes are calm. A Russian lady, admiring a sumptuous icon, made the sign of the cross, slowly as a Russian must do. This is the dreamy air of the Museum.
The artworks are all elegant, precise, restored, nothing inappropriate. Those with the imperfections of time, have been discarded.
The French, for a billion euros, loaned paintings and sculptures, perhaps not the best, but the brightest ones.
The Louvre Abu Dhabi is fun. It is essential to remove some layers of affectation to make art more accessible. The choice of free shots for selfies and photographs to upload to Facebook is necessary for a young and cosmopolitan audience. The spectators of the Louvre Abu Dhabi are different. The new tourists - the largest number of travellers - from Asian, mostly Chinese, have more lightness. Art belongs to them just if they can take pictures to show to friends who stayed at home via Instagram.
Their art study is contradictory and recent, so they have a detached approach. The arrogant liberal-colonial snobs will be disgusted. They proudly claim to be the superiors and others the worst. However, they are wrong to punish the differences in the methods. First, haughty behaviour is a sure defeat and destined to disappear, since it generates disparity. Second, analysing the emerging aspects is advantageous for searching cultural impulses. The Louvre Abu Dhabi has already understood the lesson, even before the inauguration. It is the competition of the future. The journey was started quickly, facilitated by being a current, cosmopolitan, vital, dynamic organism.
SALVATOR MUNDI, LEONARDO DA VINCI
And, Louvre Abu Dhabi does not intend to stop. Indeed, they raise like in an auction. In Christie's sale of 15 November 2017 in New York, Abu Dhabi raises the explosive offer of 450 million dollars to purchase Leonardo da Vinci's Salvator Mundi. A controversial, enigmatic artwork, with experts, divided on attribution.
It is the record for buying a painting and the next destination of Salvator Mundi will be, precisely, the Louvre Abu Dhabi.