Exhibition Morphosis at the Centre Pompidou

I am visiting the exhibition Morphosis because I want to see the Centre Pompidou. A colossal success of urban space and a brilliant architectural feat. An Italian-inclined piazza by Italian architect-heroes. The Pompidou ramp as a precedent for Herzog's Tate, a technocratic instrument parallel to Máji and the Main Train Station in Prague. Anger when recalling the tragic situation of the National Gallery in the Veletržní Palace.
The center radiates energy, I feel joy while riding the escalators over the rooftop landscape of Paris. The exhibition of the Morphosis studio symbolically on the top level, closest to the clouds. A dark room with an inclined glass platform, under which they display megacubes of models and presentations. Slipcovers with a non-slip layer of the yellow Morphosis inscription as another step to detach from the earth's gravity. Dark silhouettes skating on the glass ramp like in an 80s disco. The voices of Thom Mayne from three screens – three interviews – about the visions of new cultures, cities, megastructures, and the violation of established urban principles. Listening to Mayne seems to me the most interesting part of the whole exhibition; the words are much more understandable than the projects themselves. The graphic presentations of the projects are typically American, conceptually academic, over-colored, dematerialized, and flashy. In the end, only classic drawings and models, so it bothers me that they are too low and under glass. In one interview, Thom Mayne demonstrates the city of the future with his eyes closed in a form of pantomime. He then explains his visions like a sage from the Matrix. I do not understand his houses and do not grasp the megaprojects resembling herniated organs of the human body, just as I do not understand the symbols and icons he invents. The houses are pointed, aggressive, and formal, seemingly always circulating and moving. Fluidity. Mayne wants to disrupt the given rules and contribute his interventions to the organisms of cities and megalopolises. Nothing is given or set. He creates contexts. And he knows that only he can do it this way.

When leaving the exhibition, do not miss to notice for your calmness the studio of Shigeru Ban, whose temporary pipe hall made of pressed paper is set on the rooftop terrace. The master can be seen at work.

Other factual information – the main exhibition at the Centre Pompidou featuring sixteen current projects from the Morphosis office will last until July 17, 2006. In addition to classic means of presentation such as models, drawings, and photographs, screens and web cameras were also used to open windows into the operation of buildings or construction sites to watch their growth in real time. The entire aluminum-glass exhibit was created according to Thom Mayne's design, thus enhancing the experience of the exhibited projects. Some materials and projects from the office are presented to the public here for the very first time. (pš)