La Villette Research Articles

Light and Shadows of Tivoli Park and the Parc de la Villette

Some examples of increasingly rare and beautiful light and shadows can be found in the urban parks. Their atomsphere is based on exceptional compositions of gardens, paths and amusement facilities. In Tivoli Park and the Parc de la Villette beautiful shadows are formed by unseen patterns and devices that take into account the cultural climate and urban life.The purpose of this study is to clarify and summarize the samples taken from actual two parks with an eye. We also try to make the design characteristics (arrangement of space and material, etc.) clear.

The International Committee for the History of Technology Meeting, Paris, July 1990

Conference Report THE INTERNATIONAL COMMITTEE FOR THE HISTORY OF TECHNOLOGY MEETING, PARIS, JULY 1990 MIRIAM R. LEVIN AND ARWEN MOHUN The eighteenth meeting of the International Committee for the History of Technology, ICOHTEC, was held in the Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers (CNAM), Paris, from the 8th through the 14th ofJuly, 1990. The meeting was organized by Alexandre Herlea of the CNAM. There were three different sets of sessions: a sympo­ sium devoted to Adolphe Hirn and the subject of applied thermody­ namics, a symposium on the role of engineers in managing urban and rural spaces, and a general session on the theme of the relationship between science and technology. In all, sixty papers were presented. Angus Buchanan, secretary-general of ICOHTEC, chaired the exec­ utive committee meeting on the last day of the conference. Nearly seventy people attended the sessions each day (with time left to sample the attractions of Paris). Scholars from universities, muse­ ums, and technical institutes in western and eastern Europe, as well as the United States, Australia, Great Britain, and Japan participated, giving ample testimony to the international character of ICOHTEC. Papers were presented in either French or English, and their quality was quite high. They included a wide range of topics and approaches, particularly in the general sessions in which subject matter ranged from technology in preindustrial Europe to the history of cinematic photography. Formal commentaries added to the scholarly interest of the meeting. By limiting the number of papers in each session, organizers left time for lively discussion, although members of the audience remained wary of breaching the language barrier. M. Jacques Payen, director of the CNAM, graciously opened the Hirn symposium with a short informative introduction on the center’s history and mission; he also summarized the accomplishments of Gustave-Adolphe Hirn and discussed the two areas of research that Prof. Levin teaches in the Program in the History ofTechnology and Science at Case Western Reserve University. Ms. Mohun is a doctoral candidate in the same program.© 1991 by the Society for the History of Technology. All rights reserved. 0040-165X/91/3203-0004$01.00 594 ICOHTEC Meeting, Paris, July 1990 595 interested Hirn—applied thermodynamics and what Hirn termed “experimental metaphysics.” Not all the papers dealt directly with Hirn. What would seem a conventional subject—the steam engine— proved a point of departure for some very interesting presentations on industrial development in the American South, technological failure, the Montgolfier brothers’ experiments with heat, and the results of cooperation between private industry and government to develop tables on the thermodynamic properties of chemical com­ pounds. Papers in the symposium on engineers and the management of the landscape focused primarily on Europe and Great Britain. Although topics as diverse as water supply, the formation of networks, state highway design, and the design of public spaces were discussed, a common thread was the difficult situation confronting public officials and engineers when they design technological systems in the face of political pressures. The final session on the relationship between science and technol­ ogy included the development of ceramics, telegraphy, and several papers on the phenomenon of priority and simultaneous invention in the history of technology. There was also information on the history of technological transfer and cultural adaptations of technologies transferred from one country to another. The meeting was enriched by several outings and receptions, graciously hosted by Alexandre Herlea and other staff of the CNAM. Highlights included receptions in the Paris Hotel de Ville and in the 12th-century church, St. Martin des Champs (now the CNAM’s automobile museum); a tour of the CNAM itself; and a trip out to La Villette, former site of the slaughterhouses of Paris and now home to a hands-on science and technology museum and research center. The executive committee meeting was open to all conference attendees. Melvin Kranzberg was elected honorary president of the society. Those present urged that there be simultaneous translation at future conferences. It was suggested that the 1991 general session be devoted to a variety of topics, and that some consideration be given to papers that utilize different methodologies in the history of technology. Despite the difficulties of multilingual...

The Public Park as Avante-Garde (Landscape) Architecture: A Comparative Interpretation of Two Parisian Parks, Parc de la Villette (1983-1990) and Parc des Buttes-Chaumont (1864-1867)

Abstract What conditions are necessary for avant-garde design? Who determines whether a work is avant-garde? This essay explores these issues through the lens of a particular park, the Parc de la Villette. Here, Tschumi's creation is discussed within the context of landscape design so that its avant-garde claims can be situated. If a work is to be avant-garde, it must consciously reject the traditions of its genre. The vehicle for placing the Parc de la Villelte within the general boundaries of landscape design and, specifically, French park design traditions is a comparison with the Parc des Buttes-Chaumont, Alphand's 19th-century masterpiece. By comparing Tschumi's written text to Alphand's physical text, an argument is made that Tschumi's invention was realized in the 19th-century Parisian park. Alphand's systems aesthetic, however, differs in a significant way from that of Tschumi—it acknowledges the site as one of its “superimposed layers.” It is this recognition of the landscape medium's expressive potential that differentiates Alphand's park from Tschumi's and that opens up new interpretations of Tschumi's work as avant-garde landscape design.

Art and Science in Italy: Special Events in 1989

The most important occasion was the organization of the exhibition L'occhio di Horus: Itinerari nell'immaginario matematico (The Eye of Horus: Itineraries in the Mathematical Imagination). This event, occupying an area of 800 square meters, was held from January through July in the towns of Bologna, Parma, Milan and Rome. It was organized in cooperation with the Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, the Istituto Italiano di Studi Filosofici of Naples and the Musee des Sciences et de l'Industrie, Parc de la Villette, Paris. The idea of the exhibition originated with and its scientific and artistic coordination was handled

The Online Public Access Catalogue at the Cité des Sciences Médiathèque in Paris

1983 saw the birth of the Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie at La Villette in Paris and with it a multimedia library. The library currently holds some 300,000 documents as well as thousands of films, slides and computer programs. Entirely automated, the library uses two systems: MEDICIS for its acquisitions and cataloguing and GEAC for the circulation and online public access catalogue (OPAC). This is the first OPAC in France and is also accessible through the French Minitel videotex network. The library is divided into adult, children and research sections and also has an educational software area as well as a specially equipped room for the visually handicapped. This article describes the library and its catalogue, stock and services and notes the reactions and habits of users.

Présentation résumée en langues étrangères : Journée d'études

Scientific archives Papers read at the "Journée d'Études" organized by the Research Center on the History of Science and Technology of the Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie (Paris, La Villette, 25 February 1988) The recent development of the history of science and technology as an autonomous discipline, and more generally the interest shown for scientific and technological culture, lead to a préoccupation for the safeguard and préservation of scientific and technological archives. France is rather backward in that field, especially when compared with Anglo-Saxon countries where, for more than twenty years, specialized centers have been created for those archives. In France, the administrative records of research institutions are generally kept either by the institution itself or by the Archives nationales, through the medium of the Section des Missions, but the researchers in history of science and technology, who come from various origins, are not always aware of the existence of those records. Another useful source is the personal papers of scientists ; much remains to be done in that respect, in order to persuade the scientists themselves and their families to preserve their papers and deposit them in a place where they are open to researchers. Such are the various aspects of a policy for scientific and technological archives which it was hoped to emphasize in organizing the " Journée d'Études " at the Research Center on the History of Science and Technology of the Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie at La Villette. Since its origin, the Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie has shown its interest for scientific archives by the création of a post of archivist within the Research Center. This symposium has enabled archivists, librarians, keepers of little-known repositories, historians of science, and scientists, to meet and get better acquainted with each other. Guy Beaujouan opened the day with a description of the initiatives launched in that field by the Direction des Archives de France, the Comité des Travaux historiques et scientifiques and the Centre national de la Recherche Scientifique. The rest of the morning was dedicated to the présentation of the resources of some institutions which keep scientific archives : the Muséum d'Histoire naturelle, by Yves Laissus (part of the older archives of that institution have been transferred to the Archives nationales ; the Académie des Sciences, by Pierre Berthon ; the Library of the Institut de France, by Françoise Dumas ; the École Polytechnique, by Claudine Billoux ; and Odile Welfélé gave detailed informations on the resources ofïered to researchers by the archives of the Ministry of Research, the Centre national de la Recherche scientifique, the Palais de la Découverte, and a few others. The afternoon was dedicated to the personal papers of several scientists of the I9th. and 20th. centuries, which are kept in various institutions and have been recently classified. Françoise Parot commented on the career and papers of the psychologist Henri Piéron, founder of the Institut national d'orientation professionnelle. Thérèse Charmasson spoke of the papers of the physicist Aimé Cotton, which were deposited by his children in the Library of Physics of the École normale supérieure. Bernadette Bensaude-Vincent, Christine Blondel and Monique Monnerie explained the main stages of the constitution of the archivai fonds of the physicist Paul Langevin at the École supérieure de Physique et de Chimie, and showed how the existence of such an outstanding scientific fonds can be the nucleus of a center of historical research in a teaching and research institution. Daniel Deméllier commented on the contents and importance of the papers of Alfred Kastler, Nobel Prize of Physics, which are also deposited in the Library of Physics of the École normale supérieure. Denise Ogilvie explained how the papers of Jacques Monod, Nobel Prize of Physiology and Medicine, became the origin of the création of an archive service within the Institut Pasteur. Marie-Laure Prévost emphasized the importance of Louis Pasteur's papers, which were acquired by the Bibliothèque nationale in 1964. Michèle Sacquin commented on the difficulties she met in arranging the papers of Pierre and Marie Curie, in the Department of Manuscripts of the Bibliothèque nationale , and on their interest for the history of physics. Of course the institutional and personal archives which were presented during the " journée d'études " are not the only ones that exist. Much remains to be done for a better knowledge and a better préservation of the scientific archives of our time.

Gardens of Delight and Deception

In a recent issue of Building Design, a journal which every architect in Britain receives, a review of Glasgow’s Garden Festival comments that one would expect it to be about gardens but that it turns out to be also about architecture.A few weeks earlier the Tate Gallery organised a one-day symposium on art, architecture and Deconstruction. A piece of architecture which the philosopher Jacques Derrida, inventor of Deconstruction, claims as a rare incarnation of his ideas is the Parc de la Villette in Paris, designed by the architect Bernard Tschumi with Derrida’s, and other architects’, participation. One would expect such an architectural ‘demonstration project’ to be about buildings but in fact it turns out to be also about gardens.And both are also about science and industry.I want to ask some questions about this conflation of buildings, gardens and technology. My argument asks whether the technique of Deconstruction is applicable, even meaningful, in the context of architecture; it ‘deconstructs’ Derrida’s writing about La Villette, and finally tries to answer the question about buildings, nature, art and technology in terms of power.Deconstructing architectureThe best way to start the discussion is to start where Derrida starts—with language, and especially the written text. Much of Derrida’s work questions the logocentric basis of Western philosophy. That is, the idea that speech, one step away from directly perceived truth, is the pure form of argument, and the written text, one further step away, is a dangerous and second-best necessary evil, brought into being by the need to give philosophy a history.

Explora: the permanent exhibition of the Centre for Science and Industry at La Villette, Paris

(1987). Explora: the permanent exhibition of the Centre for Science and Industry at La Villette, Paris. Museum International: Vol. 39, No. 3, pp. 176-191.

Science for All: La Villette

The largest science museum in Europe, at La Villette in Paris, will be fully open this month. France's Centre for Science and Industry aims to do what the Georges Pompidou Centre has done for the arts: take science to the public.

‘Le caprice du prince’ — The problem of the Bastille Opéra

July 1982 saw the launching of a project to build a vast new popular opera house at the Place de la Bastille in eastern Paris. It is one of the Grand Projets, a 15.3 billion francs (about 15 million pounds) urban renewal scheme which includes expanding and renovating the Louvre, two new museums (the Musée d'Orsay and Musée de la Villette), an international communication centre at La Défense, relocating the French Ministry of Finance, an Arab Institute, and at least eleven urban regional projects (see Fig. 1). The defeat of the Socialists at the March 1986 election, to be replaced by a period of cohabitation, has jeopardized the future of the Grands Projets. This article is not a comprehensive appraisal of the Bastille Opéra scheme but has two limited aims. Firstly to discuss how the last government intended to create the new Opéra as the supreme symbol of the Socialist era. This involves an examination of the project's reception by the press and by those responsible for implementing the scheme. Secondly, to suggest that the former government's declared wish to democratize opera may not have been the most important concern and to ask whether opera can ever really become a ‘popular’ art form. The conclusion is that far from being revolutionary, Mitterrand's objectives are not so dissimilar to those of his predecessors. The latest in a series of grand architectural gestures, the Opéra was initiated primarily to commemorate a period of government and, more specifically, an individual ruler.

Investigating learning from informal sources: Listening to conversations and observing play in science museums

The knowledge that pupils bring to science lessons can come from many sources, including some that are deliberately educative and some that contain scientific information, although education is not necessarily their primary purpose. Museums provide a useful setting to investigate the process of learning from informal sources; samples of data obtained from listening to groups of people as they interact with different types of exhibit in the British Museum (Natural History), and from systematic observation of pupils investigating phenomena in the Discovery Room at the Parc de la Villette, illustrate the information that can be obtained.

Le parc de la villette entre Thélème et Disneyland

The Parc de la Villette, between Thélème and Disneyland, Danièle Voldman The plan to equip the eastern part of Paris with a big park has since 1981 become a more ambitious scheme : to invent the urban garden of the 21st century. Hundreds of architects and landscap specialists wor-ked on this adventure. But it is just as difficult to plan urban development as to plan the needs of the population of the post-industrial age. Should city dwellers get fresh air or games ? How does one design an amusement park in the French tradition without making a pale copy of its far-off American model ? Will La Villette become a new Disneyland ?

The National Museum of Science and Industry of La Villette

The National Museum of Science and Industry of La Villette

Gas and Electricity in Paris

SINCE the Jablochkoff light was established for the first time in the Avenue de l'Opera, it may be said that there has been in Paris a regular competition between gas and electricity. The “Compagnie Parisienne d'Eclairage et de Chauffage” by gas is certainly one of the largest in existence, as it possesses every gas-work in Paris, and almost every one in the vicinity. A system of subterranean pipes and valves connects all these establishments, so that gas generated in Courcelles can be sent to any part of the city and suburbs if required. All these different works were conducted as separate establishments before the fusion which took place in 1854, under the auspices of the then existing Imperial Government. Two of these establishments are worthy of note—La Villette, as being the largest, the site of experimental and chemical work, and Vaugirard, where the retorts are warmed by the Siemens' heat-generating process.

The Radiometer in a Balloon

THE Count Elemer Bathyani made a private ascent in the Tricolore balloon on Monday, August 28, with Duruof as an aëronaut. The balloon started from La Villette Gasworks at 11.50 in the morning, and descended at Chevru, near Coulomiers, about forty miles from Paris, at 2 o'clock, after having run little short of a hundred miles. The aerial craft had been overtaken by a series of winds in different directions. The culmination of the ascent was 2,500 metres.

The “Ville De Calais” Balloon Ascent

PARIS, May 3. WE made our ascent yesterday from La Villette gasworks at 1.25 P.M., and landed safely in a field at Creney, a small country place four miles south-east of Troyes, which is about 100 miles south-east from Paris. After having made observations during a little less than six hours, our grapnel was let down at ten minutes past seven. There were three of us in the car—M. Duruof, Mr. Marriott, an English correspondent in Paris, and myself. The maximum altitude reached was about 12,000 feet. The ascent was veiy gradual, and the above height was reached only at six o'clock. No sensible effect was perceived, although the temperature of the air, which on the ground was about 50° F., was no more than 26° at this altitude. We tried several experiments, with what success it remains to determine on examination of the apparatus. Some of the results, however, I am able to state here.