Georges-Eugène Haussmann

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Georges-Eugène Haussmann

Georges-Eugène Baron Haussmann ( [⁠ ʒɔʁʒ øʒɛn ba.ʁɔ os.man ⁠] , * 27. March 1809 in Paris ; † 11. January 1891 ibid) was 1853-1870 prefect of the French departments of Seine and is considered the City planner of Paris. With his regulations after the mid-19th century, he gave the city center the modern Parisian cityscape that has been preserved to this day.

Life

On his mother's side, Haussmann came from a respected Evangelical Lutheran pastor's family from the Palatinate . He was born in Paris as the second oldest child of four siblings as the son of Nicolaus-Valentin Haussmann (1787–1876) and his wife Eva Maria Henrietta Carolina, daughter of the German pastor, Jacobin and officer in the Napoleonic service, Georg Friedrich Dentzel . Haussmann's father, who was also active in higher military service under Napoléon Bonaparte , died in 1876 as an officer of the Legion of Honor . He was the grandson of Nicolas Haussmann , member of the Legislative Assembly and the Convention for the Seine-et-Oise department.

After completing his law degree in Paris in 1831, Haussmann initially served as sub-prefect in a number of provincial cities, where he was able to demonstrate his organizational talent and assertiveness. His area of ​​responsibility included, among other things, the expansion of the road network, school administration and the water supply of the communities. Napoleon III became aware of Haussmann mainly through his work in the Yonne department and in Bordeaux .

Napoleon III recognized in Haussmann the right man to realize his ambitious goals with regard to a fundamental urban redesign of his capital. In 1853 he appointed him Prefect of Paris, then Département de la Seine , and endowed him with exceptional powers. Haussmann worked in this function until 1870, to the great satisfaction of the monarch. The French emperor wanted to shape Paris into a modern metropolis of the industrial age in order to be able to compete with the capitals of the other major European powers such as London and St. Petersburg . The metropolis was to be clearly structured using monumental visual axes and adapted to the requirements of modern road and rail traffic. In addition to the traffic facilities, extensive green spaces based on the English model were created, partly as an extension and redesign of existing facilities (e.g. Jardin du Luxembourg , Bois de Boulogne ). Military aspects also played a role in the reconstruction of the city, for example the "Haussmannization" of Paris favored the warfare of regular troops against rebel citizens.

Boulevard Haussmann , Paris

The work focused primarily on the areas of the Louvre , the Tuileries Palace , the access routes to the de Hôtel Ville , the Rue de Rivoli , the area around the Opera, the Ile de la Cité , which from the time of Louis XIV. Originating Grands Boulevards and the avenues that lead to the Place de l'Étoile (today Place Charles de Gaulle ). A total of around 150 kilometers of new roads were built. In addition to the large market halls Les Halles (this hall was demolished in 1969 and replaced by the Forum des Halles ), the large train stations and other communal facilities, including several theaters and a new sewer system, were built.

The appearance of the new city district was shaped by the classicism architectural style that was widespread across Europe at the time , and the Académie des Beaux-Arts played a key role in shaping it. Haussmann also promoted the incorporation of the suburbs outside of the old fortification belt, which had already been razed in 1840. The engineers and town planners who worked for Haussmann include Jean-Charles Alphand (Bois de Boulogne, 1854), Jakob Ignaz Hittorff , Victor Baltard , Charles Garnier , Antoine Bailly and Louis Duc .

Such a radical transformation naturally also attracted critics. Initially, they complained about the irretrievable loss of cultural property, whereby the emerging art of photography was able to hold on to at least some memories of old Paris (see Charles Marville ). Furthermore, the forcible resettlement of numerous citizens and the speculation of property repeatedly caused displeasure. However, the criticism was dampened by the good employment situation.

Even before France's defeat in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870/71, the abdication of the Emperor and the establishment of the Third Republic , Haussmann, as the emperor's confidante, had to vacate his post on January 5, 1870. He was accused of having acquired his fortune in the course of urban redevelopment by participating in public tenders, but could not prove that he had broken the law. As a representative of Corsica (1877–1881), he was politically active for another decade.

reception

The redesign of Paris under Haussmann is today received in part positively despite the serious interventions in the cityscape and social structure. The Boulevard Haussmann was named after him, a street several kilometers long in the 8th and 9th arrondissement between Avenue de Friedland and Boulevard Montmartre .

Haussmann's redesign of Paris had exemplary effects on other major European cities in the 19th and 20th centuries. Bucharest was Europeanized in the second half of the 19th century, following the Paris model. But even Buenos Aires , under its mayor Torcuato de Alvear , strived to become the “Paris of South America” following the example of Haussmann's architecture, with the Avenida de Mayo , which opened in 1894, making a start. Both Mussolini and Hitler thought of similar transformations of their metropolises. Due to the density of historical buildings in Rome, Mussolini had to be content with the breakthroughs in Via della Conciliazione towards St. Peter's Basilica and Via dei Fori Imperiali towards the Colosseum in Rome . Hitler's ideas regarding the two “major axes” in Berlin (or Germania ) remained plans.

Haussmann's contemporary Jules Ferry created the bon mot of “Haussmann's fantastic invoices” ( les comptes fantastiques de Haussmann ) in view of Haussmann's seemingly fantastic plans , whereby the words compte “invoice” and conte “story” become a homophone with different meanings, accordingly an ambiguous play on words, loosely based on the opéra fantastique Hoffmann's tales ( Les contes d'Hoffmann ) by Jacques Offenbach . He published a brochure with this title in 1868. The Viennese actor and columnist Egon Friedell saw Haussmann's “new Paris” in 1931 in his cultural history of modern times as “a true reflection of the Second Empire : facade-like, screaming , artificial and parvenu-like .”

plant

  • Mémoires du Baron Haussmann. Second edition. Victor-Havard, Paris 1890–1893:
    • Volume 1: Avant l'Hotel de Ville . 1890 ( online at Gallica );
    • Volume 2: Préfecture de la Seine . 1890 ( online );
    • Volume 3: Grands travaux de Paris. 1893 ( online ).
  • Mémoires. Édition intégrale. Précédée d'une introduction générale par Francoise Choay et d'une introduction technique par Bernard Landau and Vincent Sainte Marie Gauthier . Éditions du Seuil, Paris 2000, ISBN 2-02-039898-2 .

literature

  • Jean des Cars, Pierre Pinon: Paris - Haussmann. Exhibition catalog September 19, 1991 - January 5, 1992. Éditions du Pavillon de l'Arsenal, Paris 1991, ISBN 2-907513-11-7 .
  • Jean Firges : The City of Paris. History of their development and urbanization ( Kulturgeschichtliche Reihe , 3). Sonnenberg, Annweiler 1998, ISBN 3-933264-00-6 , chap. 6.7, p. 51ff.
  • David P. Jordan: The Recreation of Paris. Baron GE Haussmann and his city. Fischer, Frankfurt 1996, ISBN 3-10-037714-1 .
    • in English: Transforming Paris. The Life and Laboratories of Baron Haussmann. Free Press, New York et al 1995, ISBN 0-02-916531-8 (also: University of Chicago Press, Chicago IL 1996, ISBN 0-226-41038-2 ).
  • Pierre Lavedan: Nouvelle histoire de Paris. Histoire de l'Urbanisme à Paris ( Collection “Que sais-je?” ). Edited by the Association pour la publication d'une histoire de Paris. Hachette Livre, Paris 1975, ISBN 2-01-001662-9 ; first Presses universitaires de France PUF, Paris 1960 (but much shorter).
  • Georges Valance : Haussmann le Grand . Flammarion, Paris 2000.

Web links

Commons : Georges Eugène Haussmann  - Collection of Images

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ See Eyal Weizman: restricted areas. Israel's architecture of the occupation . Edition Nautilus, Hamburg 2009, ISBN 3-89401-605-1 , Chapter 7;
    Regina Göckede: The colonial Le Corbusier. The Algiers projects in a postcolonial reading ( Memento from November 9, 2011 in the Internet Archive ). In: From Outer Space: Architectural Theory Outside the Discipline , 10th year, issue 2, September 2006.
  2. ^ Influence in Bucharest. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on March 8, 2012 ; accessed on May 9, 2019 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. ; Bucharest ( Memento of February 13, 2009 in the Internet Archive ). In: Encyclopedia of the European East . @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.sponsoring.erstebank.at
  3. ↑ Wolfgang Hein and Robert Schediwy in the Wiener Zeitung , January 29, 1999: Buenos Aires: The Mistress of 100 Rivers. A local inspection ( memento from February 19, 2006 in the Internet Archive ), January 29, 1999.
  4. ↑ Nanni Baltzer: "Noi dobbiamo creare (...) un'arte dei nostri tempi, un'arte fascista" (Mussolini). Photography and Architecture in Fascism. In: Thesis. Scientific journal of the Bauhaus University Weimar , 2003, Issue 4, pp. 175–186, here p. 180 ( PDF online; 910 kB ).
  5. ↑ Hartmut Frank Paris dans la tête: tendances de l'architecture urbaine en Allemagne après 1900 ( Memento of January 10, 2014 in the Internet Archive ). In: Felix Damette (Ed.): Plan urbain. Berlin Paris. Laboratoire Strates, 1995, pp. 49-62, here pp. 60 ff. (PDF; 549 kB).
  6. ↑ Jules Ferry: Comptes fantastiques d'Haussmann. Lettre adressée à MM. Les membres de la Commission du Corps législatif chargés d'examiner le nouveau projet d'emprunt de la ville de Paris. Second edition. Le Chevalier, Paris 1868. Reprinted in: Rev .: Les comptes fantastiques d'Haussmann, suivi de Les Finances de l'Hôtel de Ville. Guy Durier, Neuilly-sur-Seine 1979 ( online at Gallica ).
  7. ↑ Egon Friedell, Cultural History of Modern Times. The crisis of the European soul from the black plague to the First World War . Beck, Munich 2007, ISBN 978-3-406-63641-7 , p. 1127.
personal data
SURNAME Haussmann, Georges-Eugène
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Haussmann, Georges-Eugène Baron (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French prefect of Paris and city planner
DATE OF BIRTH March 27, 1809
PLACE OF BIRTH Paris
DATE OF DEATH January 11, 1891
Place of death Paris