The permanent collection solo exhibition "MAD X" of the Centre Pompidou in France opened on April 10. The permanent collection on display this time comes from the architectural models of MAD's 10 projects. They jointly show MAD's ideological roots of dialogue with nature from the East, and also witness MAD's "crazy", beyond reality and emotional architectural practice in the 15 years since its establishment in 2004. "This collection exhibition is a record of MAD's work process and ideological evolution over the past decade." Ma Yansong said: "'X' also has another meaning, that is, 'unknown'. On the other hand, this exhibition hopes to express the desire for the unknown, which is more important than summarizing the past."

©Hervé Véronèse

©Hervé Véronèse

Frederic Migayrou, deputy director of the Pompidou Center and curator of the "MAD X" exhibition, said: "We invited MAD this time because of the uniqueness of MAD's creation. The contemporary architectural world needs more architects like Ma Yansong, especially young architects, who are brave enough to take on challenges and influence more young people, the public and decision makers to think about the future of design."

The 10 projects exhibited at "MAD X" cover different types of buildings, some of which are already built and in use, and some are under construction. The exhibited works include MAD's first overseas completed work "Monroe Building", "Chaoyang Park Plaza" that transfers the landscape of old Beijing to the new Beijing, "Clover House" transformed from a traditional Japanese house into a kindergarten, "Lucas Museum of Narrative Art", a world-class museum created by George Lucas, the father of Star Wars, and MAD's first residential project to be completed in Europe this year - Paris UNIC.

©Hervé Véronèse

1) Thinking about modern cities

"Le Corbusier proposed the "Five Elements of Modernist Architecture" to break with classicism and make architecture conform to industrial society. This urban ideal with a vision of great social change was mechanically applied in many subsequent urban constructions, resulting in shoddy social housing, the proliferation of cars and the unlimited expansion of roads. Empty buildings that formally obey these five elements are rampant in modern cities."

——Ma Yansong

Chaoyang Park Plaza Sketch by Ma Yansong

Monroe Building, the vertical lines used to emphasize the height in traditional high-rise buildings have been eliminated, and the clever twisting dissipates the power, allowing people to refocus on the interaction with nature.

Monroe Building ©Hervé Véronèse

The East 34th Street Apartment in New York is slender and graceful, showing another kind of "urban power" with a romantic and soft atmosphere; the color of its glass curtain wall changes from dark to light from bottom to top, gradually disappearing into the sky and finally disappearing into the city background.

East 34th Street Apartment in New York

Unlike modern buildings that emphasize the sense of boundary enclosure, Chaoyang Park Plaza emphasizes the extension and penetration of nature into the city, "naturalizing" the man-made objects in the city, and using the method of "borrowing scenery" in Chinese classical garden architecture to break the boundary between Chaoyang Park and the city, so that the natural and man-made landscapes complement each other.

Chaoyang Park Plaza

Facing a 10-hectare ecological green space, UNIC enjoys extremely rich community natural resources. The building retreats from low to high, with rich layers, extending the nature of the park to the three-dimensional space of the building, like multiple stacked courtyards, bringing people and nature closer together in the city.

UNIC

2) Dialogue with the world and nature

"MAD's architecture is defined by the natural, historical and social nature of the region and is based on regional attributes, but at the same time they abandon all previous spatial assumptions. This form expresses the complexity of each environment with a bloomer and a new vision."

——Frederic Migayrou, curator of "MAD X", deputy director and architectural curator of the Pompidou Center

Harbin Grand Theater Manuscript by Ma Yansong

Located on the north bank of the Songhua River, Harbin Grand Theater is inspired by the surrounding wetland natural scenery and the frozen features of the North. Breaking out of the ice in the wetland, the building is like a floating ribbon, growing from nature and becoming part of the white horizon of the North.

Harbin Grand Theatre, ©I-TALK, Photo: XIAOYU GU

Located in the island city of Pingtan, the Pingtan Art Museum itself is like an island within an island (artificial island) that is ready to drift away at any time. It is connected to the mainland by a slightly undulating pier, connecting artificial and natural, urban and cultural, history and the future.

Pingtan Art Museum, ©I-TALK, Photo: XIAOYU GU

The Yabuli China Entrepreneurs Forum Center is backed by snow-capped mountains. In the daytime, it is like a part of the snow-capped mountains, "falling and crawling" on the snow, disappearing into the earth, and shining with the majestic momentum of the northern ice and snow world. After nightfall, the brightly lit building is like a snow tent, full of imagination.

Yabuli China Entrepreneurs Forum Center, ©I-TALK, Photo: XIAOYU GU

3) Imagination of the future city

"MAD's work is a dream building that pays tribute to nature, rather than various tall and short buildings that can be seen everywhere."

——Frederic Edelmann, architectural critic of Le Monde, France

The Clover House retains the main wooden structure of the original house and adds a white "tent shell" on the outside, forming a futuristic and open family-scale space with an overall enclosure, so that children can learn and grow in this place that has the past, present and future at the same time.

House of Clover, ©I-TALK, Photo: XIAOYU GU

Located in the Los Angeles Exposition Park, the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art is like the gateway to the exposition park, lightly "landing" in the natural environment of the park; it is also like a "floating" future warship, mysterious and surreal. The interior of the building is like a huge bright and open cave, filled with skylight; the ground floor and roof of the building are huge public spaces, returned to the city and citizens for sharing.

Lucas Museum of Narrative Art (Chicago) ©I-TALK, Photo: XIAOYU GU

Lucas Museum of Narrative Art (Los Angeles)

Nanjing Zendai Himalayas Center is like the "high mountains, small bridges, and flowing water" often mentioned in ancient landscape paintings. The central area of ​​the base is composed of a number of slope-roofed cottages scattered on a green carpet, connected by small bridges, presenting a small village-like environment. The towers on the periphery play the role of the distant view of high mountains and flowing water, while the waterscapes of the pools, waterfalls, streams, and pools in the base inherit the image and materialize the metaphor, blurring the edge between the distant view and the near view.

Nanjing Zendai Himalayas Center, ©I-TALK, Photo: XIAOYU GU

“MAD X”
MAD permanent collection exhibition

Location: Hall 28, 4th floor, Centre Pompidou, Paris, France
Time: April 10, 2019 to April 1, 2020
Leading architects: Ma Yansong, Dang Qun, Hayano Yosuke, Liu Huiying, Li Jian, Tiffany Dahlen, Fu Changrui, Andrea D'Antrassi, Lu Junliang, Flora Lee
Curatorial team: Xie Xiaozhang, Andrea Chin, Esther Greslin, Ma Yue, Li Ran