Ville, Symbolique, Forme, Projets: Communicating the Grands Projets in Paris During the 1980s

Abstract

Stating the exemplary situation of the city of Paris in regards to architecture, begun with the Beaubourg operation and fully realized with the campaign for new, monumental and strategic buildings in the heart of the city in the 1980s, a group of French architects establish in 1985 an association, “Ville et Projets”, with the explicit aim to rekindle the public debate on architecture and the city. The projects themselves were a key part of Mitterrand’s urban politics and had the potential to result controversial by virtue of their placement in the center of the historical city and the involvement of internationally acclaimed architects. While the official communication mission of the French Ministry of Culture worked on involving various media (radio, television), the association aimed to bring the architectural language and its relationship to the city and its history to the forefront of the cultural debate. The architects deem necessary to establish a firsthand narrative of the last chapter of urban transformations in Paris. This paper aims to unravel this narrative, expanding on the association’s role and influence, as well as its ambitions and the degree to which they were fulfilled, opening further questions on the role of architecture and its self-representation for the contemporary city.