Interview with Manuelle Gautrand

1.您能向我们的读者分享一下建筑学习方面的经验吗？其中又有什么事情让您印象深刻深刻呢？

学习建筑学很重要的一点就是从整体性、功能性的角度思考如何让建筑融入城市。

Jom Hutson的“悉尼歌剧院”工程让我印象尤深。当时的我刚满20岁，刚学习建筑学不久，就踏上了环游世界之旅。悉尼与法国相隔甚远，在这个全新的环境里，我发现了“悉尼歌剧院”，这座建筑结构严谨、面朝大海，当时让我尤为震撼，那一刻确实心潮澎湃，那种感觉就像站在一件艺术品前一样，激动而惊喜，也想建造一座集外形功能性于一体的建筑，能给人们带来同样的感觉，而这就是我在建筑学习中上的第一堂课。

2.您在巴黎承建过很多革命性建筑项目，那么您又是如何处理施工地与周边历史悠久的街道乃至整个城市间的关系呢？

在巴黎，历史悠久的街道与城市的关系非常重要。我们有时会碰到一些中世纪建筑地处“豪斯曼翻修”时期建筑与当代建筑之间，诚然这表明了欧洲的兴盛，我们很自豪，但是同时我们也要让“新建筑”留下来，在城市里有一席之地。从这点来看，欧洲各国首都情况各有不同，比如在北欧、荷兰等北方国家，但人们更接受这种融汇古今的做法。

如何融汇古今？在法国是个热点问题。我的观点是我们已经从这些宝贵的历史性建筑身上汲取足够多的方法、创意，用以改造旧有建筑，使其满足现代社会需要。当代建筑工艺完全可以在保持旧有建筑原貌的基础上，让其重焕生机。举个例子来说，巴黎的La GaîtéLyrique是一座老剧院，我们把这座老剧院改造成了一座集展示当代音乐、艺术于一体的文化展馆，我们保留了这座历史性剧院原貌，但加入了新设计满足（现代人）新的生活方式。

3.您的建筑风格新颖，用材多样化，那么您又如何评价自己的作品呢？

很难重新回顾所有作品，但我可以说，我对自己的每一件作品都有过创新，我的作品重视内部设施，同时也着力改善周边环境。我渴望在每一个项目上分析、发现新的经验：可能是文化方面、地理方面、国家层面又或是某个特别地方，每一个项目及周边的环境都帮助我重新规划策略，以求切合实地发展需要。通过寻找项目、施工地间的关系，我们精雕细琢每一座建筑，这就表现为不同的配色、选材、外形和用量。

说到这里，（建筑的）各个立面是重点，立面就像城市和建筑间的“滤网”。不管从内向外或从外向内看，居住者都会把“立面”当作基础，“立面”对任何人来说都是首先引入眼帘，因此“立面”必须有表现力、吸引力，甚至有时候能在城市中树立一个令人印象深刻的地标，比如公共建筑或文化建筑。

我同样关注自然光线，研究珍贵的自然光线如何进入建筑内部，不管是以一种精巧方式、以白光还是彩色光、亮光还是柔光，自然光的确可以“勾勒”空间，也是营造别致“氛围”的关键。

4.您有为自己的作品做过手工模型，这些模型如何帮助您完善作品呢？

这些模型在施工过程中很重要，不同的阶段都会做不同的模型，用作测试城市环境、技术信息等等。在工地，我们通过模型控制、检验项目施工是否偏离目标，我们的精神、品质是否依旧如是、倍受尊重。

5.您在许多作品中用色大胆，令人影响深刻。请问灵感源自何处？

我没有明确的答案，甚至很难说我们的灵感、选择是否来自过去所见所闻。

我的灵感来自旅行，我尽一切可能的多旅行！我确信能在不同的文化、城市、建筑、风光中获益匪浅。旅行中的体验、感受、灵感都体现在我的作品之中。

当代艺术家作品中的外形、配色同样给了我深深的启发。比如位于法国北部“北屯”（Béthune）的“国家戏剧中心”（Dramatic National Center）就受艺术家“皮埃尔.苏兰奇”（Pierre Soulages）作品的微妙影响。我曾在1999年承建“国家戏剧中心”首期工程，当时为外墙选用紫色以突显传统紫色砖块、映衬这块传统区域，十年后再次受托兴建后续工程。看过“皮埃尔.苏兰奇”作品后，我发现黑色的表面作用居然如此强大，可以精妙反射大量光线，让材料质感突出。因此，我们敲定黑色为后续工程配色，显得深沉、有力。为了使首期工程和后续工程衔接自然，我们选用了编织金属板承载黑色，大量的菱形同先前的紫色砖块相得益彰。

6.您于2017年获“欧洲建筑奖”（European Prize for Architecture）。作为第一位法国建筑师同时也是第一位女性建筑师荣获此殊荣，您能分享下当时的感想吗？

我很高兴得奖，尤其在我没有主动申请情况下得奖，而且这个奖在欧洲是如此特殊。

事实上，我对欧洲充满狂热的感情。尽管我作为第一位法国人获奖，但比起法国艺术家，我更喜欢把自己视作一位欧洲艺术家。

诚然，“欧洲建筑奖”是授予那些“承诺推动欧洲人文主义、建筑艺术前进”的艺术家。我从自己职业生涯开始时就践行这一承诺，用欧洲精髓让我们的建筑、城市重焕魅力。

我很荣幸获此殊荣，这个奖让也让我坚定决心将建筑艺术发扬光大。

7.您的作品涉及建筑种类繁多，从文化设施、居民楼再到商用办公楼，您现在还有兴趣探索未来建筑类型吗？

我当然对探索新建筑类型非常有兴趣。但我对未来建筑项目还没有特别的设想…我希望让建筑充满激情与惊喜。

对于选址，我的答案依然如此。目前我们在斯德哥尔摩（瑞典）和帕拉马塔（悉尼）都有项目，我喜欢发现新的建筑方式，这种方式完全不同于我们在法国的建筑方式。但我认为我们可以在不同的地方学到新东西，中国可能就是个做项目的好地方。

8.您对中国当代建筑有何看法？如果有机会，您想在中国设计什么样的建筑？

我没有任何“先验”观点，我总是把每一次机会视作一次新创作。经验证明，在新的国家工作，我们必须保持开放的心态，积极开发新客户、探索新环境，这样才能有所进步。

客户总是需要有能力的建筑商，有能力处理复杂的项目。我们以往的项目大多在一个甚至几个方面十分复杂，（周边）环境复杂、项目复杂、技术复杂等等。同时我也认为客户需要保持良好的沟通、项目背后坚定的决心、每次提出与之前不同的全新建筑。

1. Could you like to share with our readers your experiences in learning architecture? Is there anything that impressed you most?

An important point when one is “learning architecture”, is to consider architecture as a whole, as a way to gather functions and people, to think and build a part of a city.

One project which impressed me has been the Sydney Opera from Jom Hutson. I was 20 then; I had just started my architecture studies and was undertaking a worldwide travel. Far from France, in a new environment, I found this organic but rigorous architecture facing the Ocean rather striking. That was a very emotional moment, with strong feelings as you sometimes get in front of an artwork. Getting emotions, being surprised, wanting to do to same by creating a building shape and functions, are to me essential in “learning architecture”.

2. You have done many renovation projects in Paris. How do you deal with the relationship between the site and the historic street and even the city?

This relation between the historic street and the city is indeed very important in Paris. We have sometimes buildings from the middle-ages cohabiting with both Haussmanian buildings and contemporary architecture: this mixture is one of Europe richness and we have to be proud of it, but we also have to be careful to let architecture on the site leave, to enable the “new architecture” to express itself in the city.

From that point of view, European capitals react very differently, for instance in “Northern countries” (Scandinavia,the Netherlands, etc.), the mixture seems better accepted.

It is a highly topical issue in France: how to mix the new and the old? My point of view is that we have, accepted from some precious historical buildings, enough ability and creativity to make the old evolve to answer modern society’s requirements. Contemporary architecture can def i nitely make the old shine brighter, without altering it.That is for instance what we did with La Gaîté Lyrique in Paris: an old theatre we converted into a cultural place for contemporary music and arts, mixing new ways of thinking, of living, and an historical hall we had to preserve.

3. Your architecture form is innovative, and the materials used are various. How do you promote and realize each of your creation?

It is diffcult to resume a whole attitude facing each creation. But I could say that I try, for each project to invent a specif i c envelop, which both emphasizes the interior functionalities and improves the context around the project’s site. For each project indeed, I’m eager to discover and analyze a new universe: it can be a cultural universe, it can be also a geographic one, a country, a special site…each context and program help me to reformulate a new strategy, deeply adapted and developed. Thus, we are sculpting a building in relation to a site and a program,which leads to a choice of specif i c colors, materials, patterns or volumes.

Within this process, the façades are one important point, as they are like a filter between the town and the program, and this filter is fundamental in the perception that the users will have, from the outside and from the inside. It is the fi rst materiality that everybody will perceive at fi rst sight, so it has to express, attract, and sometimes create a unforgettable signage in the city, speaking for example about public and/cultural equipment.

I am also deeply concerned by the natural light and due to that, we always study in details how this precious natural light will enter inside the project, in a delicate or generous way, in a neutral or colored way, in a bright or soft way: the natural light literally sculpts and shapes a space, it is a key point which converges to a specif i c“atmosphere”.

观察组既往接受PCI的比例明显高于对照组，差异有统计学意义（P＜0.05）；观察组中合并高血压、高脂血症、糖尿病、脑卒中史、陈旧性心肌梗死及肺功能减退的比例高于对照组，吸烟史低于对照组，差异无统计学意义（P＞0.05）。见表1。

4. You make manual models for many of your designs. How do these models help you perfect your work?

The physical models are essential in our process, and we are doing new models on each stage of the studies.They are a way to test everything, from urban and contextual questions to technical details. They always keep a rule which is a strong guideline, when we arrive the site construction: a way to control and check that our objectives are not away, and that the spirit we wanted to instill is still kept and respected.

皇宫剧院，2010-2014年，法国Le Palace Theater 2_Bethune, France_built 2010-2014

路易・威登旗舰店，2011年竞赛项目，韩国首尔Louis Vuitton Maison_seoul, Korea_competition 2011

5.The colors you use in many of your works are bold and very impressive. How do you get inspiration?

I do not have def i ned referents, even if it is diffcult to say whether our inspiration or decisions come from other people’s work we may have seen in the past.

I get my inspiration from travelling, which I do as frequently as possible! Indeed, I am certain that we have a lot to learn from different cultures, different cities, different architectures, different landscapes, etc. and in each of my projects I include sparkles of memories, feelings, inspirations, from my past travels.

Also, I am deeply inspired by contemporary artists, by their plastic work of shapes and colors. For instance, for the Dramatic National Center extension we built in Béthune, North of France, there is a delicate inspiration taken from the artist Pierre Soulages’ work. We had created the initial theater in 1999, with purple rounded shape reminding the traditional bricks colors traditional in this area and were commissioned to build the extension 10 years later. By looking at Pierre Soulage’s work, I had discovered that the black color could be so versatile and subtle in allowing in its surface an inf i nite amount of ref l ects and lights, and in the end, could become a wonderful material. So eventually, we coated this extension in black, as a deep and powerful color. To create a soft link with the initial volume, this black was implemented in the form of a kind of weaving metal panels, which are drawing large rhombuses, to remind the ones of the purple rounded shape. The waves of these panels, mat and glossy,take the light differently, depending on their degree of shine and their orientation to the light.

6. You received the 2017 European Prize for Architecture, and are and first French Architect,and the first female architect. Could you share with us your feelings at that time?

I have been very happy to receive this prize, especially because I had not applied for it, and because it is a specif i cally European one.

Indeed, I am an ardent passionate of my country Europe and I consider myself more a European architect than a French architect, even if I have been honored to be the fi rst French agency to receive it!

Also, the European Prize for Architecture is awarded to architects “who have made commitment to forward the principles of European humanism and the art of architecture”. I have tried since the beginning of my carrier to express and emphasize such a commitment, to use European roots to reenchant architecture and our cities.

So, this prize comes as a great honor and as an even bigger reason to make architecture shine.

7. Your work is in a variety of areas ranging from cultural facilities to residential, commercial and office buildings. Do you still have interest in exploring new area in the future?

Of course I have a deep interest in exploring new area in the future. But I do not think I have a special dream regarding future programs…I would like to keep building passionating projects, and to keep being surprised!

And concerning the location, I would answer quite the same. We are currently working on projects in Stockholm in Sweden and Parramatta (Great Sydney) in Australia, and I am deeply enjoying discovering “new ways of building”, following processes different from those in France. But I think we can learn from any place we work in;China would be a great place to start a project too!

8. What do you think of Chinese contemporary architecture? And what kind of work would you like to design in China if you have a chance?

I don’t have any “a-priori”, and always look at the opportunities as new fi elds of creation. To work in a new country,we need to be open-minded and look forward to discover a new client and a new context, which is a promise for a lot of improvement in our experiences.

Clients are looking for an agency capable of dealing with complex projects; most projects we have delivered were complex in one or many aspects: complex environment, complex program, technical challenge, etc. Also, I think clients are looking for dialogue, and for a strong determination to go beyond the program and to propose each time a brand-new Architecture.