Nov 6, 2008


PARIS (AFP) — For the first time in its history, the Louvre museum Thursday opens its doors to a musician, France's renowned contemporary composer and conductor, Pierre Boulez, giving the classical arthouse a modern touch.

To the French, the 83-year-old supremo of serial, experimental and electronic music born in the central Loire valley is what the Japanese call "a living national treasure", celebrated for his unique contribution to music and to intellectual life since the 1950s.

Scheduled to run until February 9, the show titled "The Louvre Invites Pierre Boulez" gathers together art and music in a medley that includes an exhibition, 11 concerts, six filmed concerts and talks.

Curated by the maestro himself, the art show titled "Work:Fragment" gathers 70 works by artists such as Ingres, Cezanne, Degas, Delacroix, Kandinsky, Klee, Giacometti and Picasso alongside scores from Wagner, Bartok and Varese and works by writers from the 19th and 20th centuries.

"Modernism is based on the fragment," Boulez told AFP, pointing to a 1952 nude sketch by De Kooning, "while previously this would have been considered a preparory draft."

The sketch, one of a series of "Women", showed "something that hasn't yet taken shape but is on the way," Boulez added.

Also rarely on public show are Russian-born Stravinsky's first drafts of "The Rite of Spring", a work from the 20th-century composer often conducted by Boulez -- which he said underlined "the chronological anarchy of invention."

In a hallway, Boulez enthusiasts can stop to listen to his 1996-1998 work "Sur Incises" for three pianos, three harps and three mallet instruments.

Boulez, who began composing at 23 and was influenced by Olivier Messiaen, was one of the leaders of a post-war movement to greater abstraction and experimentation in music and in 2002 won the Glenn Gould Prize for his contributions.

But he has also directed some of the world leading symphony orchestras and ensembles, including the New York Philharmonic, and is currently Conductor Emeritus of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.

Visitors to the Louvre show will be treated to live concerts including a free December 2 performance featuring Boulez conducting Stravinsky's "The Firebird".

The modernist master also joins a debate with architect Jean Nouvel, this year's winner of architecture's top prize, the Pritzker, on the building of a Paris Philharmonic Hall, due to be opened in 2012.


Copyright: http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5jIVDu8PVir97KPJTy00t2NeXBp0g

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