DECQ & CORNETTE

  Presentation
Exhibition
Resources
Frac Collection

(F)

Odile Decq (*1955)
Benoît Cornette (*1953-1998)

 

 

 
Presentation
       
 
     
Since 1985, Decq & Cornette have called on an architectural style which hinges on a dynamic opening-up of space by making use of "hyper-tension" (Centre for Cultural Exchange, Osaka, 1991, or "Hyper-Tension", installation within the Grenoble Contemporary Art Centre, 1993) where integrating movement generates a tension and complexity in spatial perception. This architecture, calling on transferral and instability -- and in which tectonics become "tectogenesis" -- has adopted a concrete form as seen, among other projects, in the Banque Populaire de l'Ouest building in Rennes (1990), the recipient of numerous prizes or, additionally, in three buildings for Nantes University (1998), among their many realisations. In 1996, they received the Golden Lion Award at the Architectural Biennial in Venice for their work as a whole. In 1997, they won the design competition for stands for a rugby stadium in Orléans and, in 1998, the City of Rotterdam requested their design for a third bridge project. Decq & Cornette have also worked on the development of the Gennevilliers Port and, among other projects, they are designing cultural complexes and restaurants in Cambridge and in London. At the same time, Odile Decq is also a professor at the Special Architecture School of Paris, and also in other institutions.
   
       
       
       
     
         
 
       
 
Exhibition
       
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Steathly fluid (moving) spaces
   
           
     

Paul Virilio said to his students that after the time of functionalistic resolution during the first part of this century in terms of abstract rationalistic solutions, after the time of answering the social needs during the emerging of a new society in the second part of this century in terms of quantitative social solutions, architecture, today, has to answer the question of desire in terms of giving pleasure (...) but, giving more an answer to the question of desire is complex. Each answer has to be specific and at stake. Nothing is definitive, every solution is transitory.

These notions question the place of the body and the senses in space and architecture. The displacement of the body inside space, the instability generated by movement, the instability which creates movement change our way of perceiving space by all our senses. After sedentarity of the body during all the classic periods where the space is perceived from a static point, we are now in the dynamic period in which the body is unstable, where the time and the space are perceived as instants, as events instead of permanent. We enter into the nomadic period in which the discontinuity of space and the fracture of time is a modern condition. We never think on centered space and axes pointed from and to an one observer but in sliding and tangential spaces in chaining images to create escaping lines, moving perspectives, sequential images where the tension is introduced in the assemblage of fading forms.

(...) The modern urban space is definetely not in the order of the City : the notion of centrality disappears and gives it place to movement, to sliding, to continuous displacement of places and activities. Territory is no longer define by its boundaries but by the network and the connexions inside it. Territory is now always polycentric. The displacement inside cities and territories redifines them as a network in continuous fluctuation.

We have to stop to think with the old notion of centrality, referred to an abstract man, in order to think the world as a topologic apparent disorder which defined new urban forms spreaded over the territories by relations of continuity in discontinuity, deformations, bifurcations, density and dynamic heterogeneity rather than metric system and we have to put into question the static spatiality and constance of the urban form in time.

We integrate the necessity of displacement and movement of the body inside space from the beginning. The succession of point of views, thought as unstability of the view generates a dynamic vision of the space. The variation of perspectives creates a permanent tension and a sensual ambiguity in complexity and perception of space. The sequential articulation of images such as the linear distorsion constantly displaces and perturbes the point of view. Material, light, texture, colours, same as forms, shadows, tension, density, promenade, transgression, hypertrophy, all are our combined tools to create spaces in which senses are awake. Architecture and space is a constant discovery and is never out of bounds.

Odile Decq

   
       
     
     
     
           
     
Economics UFR, Nantes, Campus de l'Erdre, France, 1998
   
           
     

The UFR is situated very close to the Law Library, and, with it and the Human Science Centre, forms the same single but fragmented complex. The UFR, which, in particular, borrows the same lengthwise structural layout as the library (7.6 metres), consists of two buildings facing one another, and linked by three levels of footbridges. Access to it is by way of a mineral courtyard opening on to the Law School. The lecture hall, which is lodged in the sloping ground, faces the river Erdre head-on, and, at the bottom of the slope, stands between the two wings of the UFR. The main students' entrance is located on the north façade, opposite the library entrance. Each of the two UFR wings is devoted to a precise function: teaching for the wider south wing; research and administration for the narrower north wing. The halls, set on four levels, offer framed views over the forest and the river Erdre.

   
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Pub Renault, Paris, 1998
   
           
     

In the "Pub Renault" redevelopment project, the whole façade is designed like a James Turrell installation, which spreads light over its entire surface. It is a depth to be passed through in order to enter the place. The space is transformed as required by its users, based on a limited number of predefined features which are the spatial components:
- the active membrane: a fluid surface whose articulated arc-based structure provides configurations of multi-shaped spaces, which support different types of stretched skin (translucent, opaque, white and coloured...)
- the sensitive sheets: sets of flat screens creating varied and extended spaces which can be changed at will
- the communication hub: a permanent platform for TV and radio events, this is also the modular stage at the heart of actual performances and shows. Each one of the elements, itself made up of several elements, is transformable and moveable.

   
       
     
     
     
           
     
A Third City Bridge, Rotterdam, Holland, 1998
   
           
     

The aim of the project is to galvanize new urban developments along the river. A new island has accordingly been created, acting as a base for the central pier of the bridge, on which a series of five highrise office towers is to be built. The island is also the site earmarked for the location of a cultural facility for water sports. The bridge itself is a dual structure, organized around a separation between the flow of pedestrian and bicycle traffic, associated with the promenade, and the flow of cars and trams, associated with urban transportation. The bridge and the footbridge are 12.5 metres above the river, over a length of 200 metres. Both bridges, which are so arranged that they can be raised together, are moveable over a length of 50 metres between the piers, which form the main supporting pylon of the bridge-cum-footbridge. Here it is the landscape that is transformed and turns into bridge or footbridge, rather than a bridge and footbridge set on top of a landscape.

   
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Law Library, Nantes, Campus de l'Erdre, France, 1998
   
           
     

The Law Library is part of a system of parallel strips, adjacent to the strip that awaits its future extension, and the UFR Economics building and the Human Science Centre, both also designed by Decq & Cornette. This project is thus incorporated in a "bar code" system which forms a single but fragmented complex, offering a variation on the campus layout, in order to "finish" this layout, while at the same time dealing with the organization of the different university units and filtering access to the listed woodland.
A large reading room, set on three levels, gives on to this woodland area to the south. Its all-glass façade is lined by a brise-soleil, which creates a shady entrance gallery built to the same scale as the library. This latter is flanked on the north façade by a service strip which encompasses all the vertical traffic and movement, the offices, and the technical department.

   
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Resources
       
 
 
Biography
       
     
DECQ & CORNETTE

Odile Decq
(1955)
1978 - Diplômée de l'Ecole d'Architecture de Paris-La Villette.
1979 - DESS, Urbanisme et Aménagement, Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris.
Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et Lettres ; Membre de l'Académie d'Architecture.
Enseignement :
1999 / 1992 - Enseignante à l'Ecole Spéciale d'Architecture, Paris.
1992 - Professeur invité à l'Université de Montréal.
1998 - Enseignante au T.U. de Vienne (Autriche)
1986 / 1984 - Enseignante à l'Ecole d'Architecture de Paris-La Villette.

Benoît Cornette (1953-1998)
1971 / 1977 - Etudes de médecine, Faculté de Rennes.
1985 - Diplômé de l'Ecole d'Architecture de Paris-La Villette.
Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et Lettres.
Enseignement :
1998 / 1997 - Workshop à Paris Kansas University.
1993 / 1992 - Enseignant à l'Ecole Spéciale d'Architecture.
1985 - Fondation de l'Agence à Paris.
1986 - Albums de la Jeune Architecture.
1990 - 9th International Prize for Architecture.
1994 - Benedictus Awards, Washington DC, USA.
1996 - Lion d'Or, Biennale de Venise, VIe Mostra Internationale d'Architecture.

Principaux projets et réalisations :
1999 - (en cours) Aménagement du Port de Gennevilliers pour le Port Autonome de Paris ; Complexe Salles de cinéma, librairie, vidéothèque, médiathèque, brasserie, restaurant, ateliers, administration à Cambridge (GB) ; Saint-Gobain Recherche à Aubervilliers; Un nouveau concept de restaurant à Londres.
1998 - Nouveau Pub Renault 1 & 2, Paris ; "A third City Bridge" Rotterdam (projet).
1998 - 1993 - Trois bâtiments pour l'Université de Nantes - UFR, Bibliothèque, Maison des Sciences de l'Homme.
1997 - Immeuble de logements à Paris.
1996 - Le viaduc de l'autoroute A 14 à Nanterre et le Centre d'Exploitation de l'Autoroute suspendu en dessous ; Aménagement et transformation du site GDF en site résidentiel et équipements publics, Roquebrune Cap-Martin ; Scénographie du Pavillon Français à la Biennale de Venise, VIe Mostra Intern.d'Architecture.
1994 - Parc d'activités aéroportuaires, St Jacques de la Lande, Rennes.
1995 - Métafort, Aubervilliers (lauréat) - Cité des Arts de Fort d'Aubervilliers.
1990 - Banque Populaire de l'Ouest, Rennes.
   
 
Bibliography
       
     
1996 - " Hyper-tension ", d'Architecture n°68. (réed. catalogue de la Biennale d'Architecture de Venise, " Bloc, le monolithe fracturé ", édit. HYX, Orléans.
Bibliographie sélective :
1999 - " The Contemporary Architecture guide vol.1 " Toto Publications, Tokyo.
" re-création, 21 architectes à l'aube du XXIème siècle ", catalogue de la Biennale d'Architecture de Buenos Aires ".
1998 - Displaced Grid, RIBA / FRAC Centre ; " Exploding the river " NAI Uilgevers Publishers, Rotterdam ; Archis (nov.), Rotterdam ; d'Architectures (n°79, 83) ; Contemporary World Architecture, Editions Phaïdon
1997 - The Architect's Journal (n°22), Grande-Bretagne ; The Architectural's Journal (fév.) ; Domus n°791, Italie ; AMC n°92 ; Le Moniteur n°4880 ; Architecture Intérieure Créée n°282.
1996 - Monographie Editions Phaïdon, Londres ; L'Arca n°104 et 110, Italie ; Architectural Culture n°786, Corée ; AMC n°72 ;Architecture n°3, Hong Kong ; Blue Print n°133, Angleterre ; ArtPress n°216 ; Hinge Magazine n°21, Hong Kong ; L'arca International n°102, Italie ; World Architecture n°9601, Chine.
1995 - Monographie Editions Aedes, Berlin ; L'Arca (n°89, 90 et n°94), Italie ; Bauwelt (n°31), Allemegne ; Paroles (n°7/8), Hong-Kong ; Nuova Finestra (n°7/8) ; Architektur (n°9), Allemagne ; Architectural Design (n°65) ; Archi-Crée (n°267) ; Newsline, USA ; D'Architectures (n°59) ; Beaux-Arts Magazine (n°138) Techniques & Architectures (n°422) ; Le Moniteur (n°4797).
1991 - Monographie Banque Populaire de l'Ouest, Paris.
   
           
           
         
           
 
FRAC Collection
       
 
           
 
Project for the Apple Computer France headquarters, Saint Quentin-en-Yvelines, 1989
Set consisting of 1 model, 6 drawings and 11 polaroid photographs
 
drawing
  Untitled
Untitled Set of 6 drawings
Ink on paper
N¡ INV FRAC CE 995.01.05 ˆ 995.01.10
   
polaroid
  Untitled
11 polaroid photographs mounted on lead
N¡ INV FRAC CE 995.01.11