Fernand Pouillon

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Fernand Pouillon (born May 14, 1912 in Cancon , Lot-et-Garonne Department , † July 24, 1986 in Belcastel ) was a French architect , town planner and writer .

Fernand Pouillon was one of the builders who played a key role in the reconstruction of France after the Second World War. He has planned and carried out numerous developments and public contracts in Marseille , Aix-en-Provence , the greater Paris area, Algeria and Iran.

biography

Hotel El Marsa in Sidi-Ferruch, Algeria

Fernand Pouillon was born in Cancon in 1912, the son of a civil engineer. At first he wanted to be a painter and from 1929 studied at the École des Beaux-Arts in Marseille. From 1932 to 1934 he studied architecture in Paris. In 1936 - at the age of 22 and without a diploma - he constructed his first property in Aix-en-Provence , which was still possible before the Vichy regime . He only received his architecture diploma in 1942. By 1944 he carried out work for the city of Marseille under the direction of Eugène Beaudouin (1898–1983) . From 1944 to 1953, Pouillon and his partner René Egger were actively involved in the reconstruction of the old port district of Marseille, which had been blown up by the SS in 1943. From 1944 to 1947 he was a member of the Communist Party . In the 1950s he realized many public buildings in Aix-en-Provence , Marseille and French Algeria.

In 1961 he was commissioned to build a complex of cheap apartments on the outskirts of Paris. In this project he appeared as an entrepreneur and as an architect, which was illegal under the legal situation at the time. Pouillon was reported by competition, his company was examined by the prosecutor, which resulted in his sentencing to four years in prison. After eight months in prison, he went on a hunger strike, played the seriously ill, and was then transferred to another, less guarded part of the prison. His brother smuggled a rope there that he could use to escape from a window. With the help of his friends at the Sorbonne, who were privy to the escape plans, he escaped, first to Fiesole in Tuscany, and from there to Algeria.

The group of friends at the Sorbonne meanwhile collected exculpatory material on his case to prove his innocence. In 1963 he returned to France and faced the court. In a high-profile trial, the court acquitted him of the charges, but was punished for escaping from prison. In prison he wrote his only novel Singende Steine (Orig .: Les pierres sauvages ), a diary novel about the construction of the Cistercian monastery Le Thoronet from the perspective of the builder Wilhelm Baltz.

He spent the years 1966 to 1972 in voluntary exile in Algeria, where he worked as an architect. In Algeria he built hotels, administrative buildings, post offices and buildings for universities.

In 1968 he published his memoirs under the title "Memoires d'un architecte". In June 1971 he was pardoned as part of an amnesty by Georges Pompidou and in 1980 he was again accepted into the Paris Association of Architects ( Ordre des Architectes de Paris ). In 1984 he returned to France. In 1985 François Mitterrand appointed him officer of the Legion of Honor.

Pouillon was married four times and had six children. He died at the age of 74 in the Château de Belcastel and was buried anonymously in the village cemetery at his request.

plant

There was a great shortage of housing in France after the war. Pouillon's goal was to build high quality but inexpensive residential buildings that as many people as possible could financially afford. He claimed that he could build 200 apartments in 200 days and a budget of 200 million francs. This project succeeded. In 1953 he was commissioned by the city of Algiers to repeat a similar project, taking into account the local architectural style. He created 1,600 residential units within a year. This project earned him a follow-up contract in Iran.

In 1961 he was commissioned to build a complex of cheap apartments outside Paris, where he performed as an entrepreneur and architect, which led to his conviction and voluntary exile in Algeria.

After his return from exile, he restored the completely dilapidated Château de Belcastel in Auvergne as his residence. In 1976 he built a monastery in Provence for Algerian nuns who had returned to France after Algeria gained independence. In 1984 he created a center for the Ministry of Culture near Versailles and an administrative building for the Paris Academy of Music.

Pouillon was not a fan of concrete buildings, instead he preferred natural stone, steel, glass, ceramics and wood. He integrated gardens, water basins and fountains into his superstructures, which were designed by sculptors such as Jean Amado (1922–1995).

  • Résidence Stade Buffalo housing estate, 466 apartments, Montrouge near Paris (1958)
  • Résidence Victor Hugo housing estate, 262 apartments, Pantin near Paris (1963)

Honors

Several of his buildings, including La Tourette in Marseille and Le Parc in Meudon-la-Forêt , have been awarded the Patrimoine du XXe siècle label by the French Ministry of Culture .

In 2008, Pouillon was posthumously honored by the Algerian Minister of Tourism, Cherif Rahmani, for his complete work in Algeria from 1964 to 1984.

In 1965 he received the Prix ​​des Deux Magots for his novel Singing Stones .

Fonts

  • Les pierres sauvages . Paris: Du Seuil 1964. ISBN 2-02001023-2
    German translation: Singing stones. Wilhelm Balz's notes . From d. Franz. By Gudrun Trüb. Edition Tertium, Ostfildern 1999, ISBN 3-930717-31-X .
    English translation: The stones of the Abbey . Harcourt, Brace & World, New York 1970.
  • Mémoires d'un architecte . Paris: You Seuil. 1968.
  • Les Baux de Provence ce recueil monumental comprend monographie, vues d'ensemble du site releves de l'eglise, des batiments, des environs, ainsi que les details d'ornement. Paris: De Nobele 1973.
    A folio volume with 58 partially fold-out panels, printed in a limited edition of 250 pieces.
  • Mon ambition. Textes présentés et choisis by Bernard Marrey. Paris: Du Linteau 2011.
    A selection from his writings.

literature

  • Jean-Lucien Bonillo: Fernand Pouillon - Architecte Mediterraneen . Imbernon, Marseille 2001. ISBN 2-9516396-0-0 .
  • Bernard Félix Dubor: Fernand Pouillon . Le Moniteur, Paris 1986. ISBN 2-86653-039-X .
  • Daniele Voldman: Fernand Pouillon - Architecte . Payot, Paris 2006. ISBN 2-228-90115-6 .
  • Marc Bédarida: Fernand Pouillon . Éditions du Patrimoine, Paris 2012.
  • Adam Caruso and Helen Thomas (eds.): The Stones of Fernand Pouillon - An Alternative Modernism in French Architecture . gta Verlag, Zurich 2013. ISBN 978-3-85676-324-4 .

Web links

Commons : Fernand Pouillon  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ About Fernand Pouillon (Architect) ( Memento of the original from August 14, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. accessed on August 13, 2014  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / chateaudebelcastel.com
  2. ↑ Fernand Pouillon, architecte urbain et visionnaire, accessed on August 13, 2014.
personal data
SURNAME Pouillon, Fernand
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French architect and writer
DATE OF BIRTH May 14, 1912
PLACE OF BIRTH Cancon
DATE OF DEATH July 24, 1986
Place of death Belcastel