Virtual Machines: Culture, telematics, and the architecture of information at Centre Beaubourg, 1968-1977
This doctoral dissertation examines the way in which the architecture of the library and museum in the late 1960s was conceived as a technology for the organization and dissemination of cultural information. It considers the overall history of the Centre Pompidou in Paris, from its origins in the mid-1960s to its opening in 1977. In particular, it looks at ways in which the verbal, graphic, and built statements of the project’s creators, apologists, and critics engaged the discourses of the post-industrial information society. [More...]
Décollage
Renovation work in the École Militaire métro station during a visit to Paris last Spring produced this found object — a promotional poster inviting visitors to the new Orly south terminal, inaugurated by de Gaulle in 1961. Translation: “Visit Orly: Come see an achievement of French technology.”
Engineering Beaubourg’s information spaces
From the outset, the Centre Pompidou was to be a live center of information. This paper situated the challenges posed by that vision in the context of emerging models of technical expertise in architecture.