I Prefer Paris: La Bourse de Commerce- Pinault Collection

Ever since I can remember, I’ve always admired La Bourse de Commerce, a stunning rotunda bordering Les Halles, but it remained a mystery, piquing my curiosity. What was this building before, why is this architectural wonder empty and not being used, and why don’t they put something fabulous in there?

All these questions were recently answered when La Bourse de Commerce opened in June this year.

The original structure, which was the wheat exchange of Paris, was erected from 1763 to 1767 and used for the storage and buying and selling of wheat. It was side by side with Les Halles, the great wholesale food market of Paris at the time. The Paris Commodities market took over the building and in 1886, it went through a major reconstruction which included decorative new features such as three allegorical sculptures, four Corinthian columns, and wall frescoes by noted artists of the period. Luckily, these architectural elements were classified as historical monuments by the City of Paris, and didn’t suffer the same fate as Les Halles, which was torn down in the late 1960s, and rebuilt as a tacky, soulless shopping mall in the 1970s.

Multi -billionaire Francoise Pinault, who made his mega fortune by owning high fashion luxury brands such as Gucci, Bottega Veneta, Saint Laurent, and Balenciaga, has acquired a vast contemporary art collection over the last decades. The collection boasts over 10,000 pieces and is worth approximately 1.25 billion euros. What to do with and where to put all that art has always been on Pinault’s mind. Like other like-minded collectors of this magnitude, Pinault sought to display his art in venues of his own choosing rather than donate them to a museum. His original plan was to take over the old Citroen factory in the 15^th arrondissement of Paris, and create a museum, but the city gave him a hard time and lots of red tape, so he abandoned the project and bought a palazzo in Venice instead to showcase his collection.

Pinault was still determined to have a museum in Paris and perhaps prompted or maybe stung by the fact that his business archrival Bernard Arnault, opened the Frank Gehry designed Louis Vuitton Museum with his major art collection. In 2016, Pinault signed a 50-year lease with the city for Bourse de Commerce to display his collection and commissioned Pritzker prize winning architect Tadao Ando to design and overhaul the space. The focal point of the museum is the striking 30 foot high and 95-foot-wide concrete cylinder in which the contents of the museum revolve around. At the top of the open cylinder is a dome with painted frescoes at which you must crane your neck to study in detail.

I visited La Bourse de Commerce last month, and even though I read many articles and blogs about it, it didn’t prepare me for the astonishing beauty of the space. I was so taken by the architecture and the way the dome was constructed, looking at the art was an afterthought. I loved the sculptures that were on the floor under the rotunda by artist Urs Fischer, especially the centerpiece which resembles a classic, Italian marble statue but upon closer inspection it’s made of wax. There are wicks connected to the wax and the idea is that the life of the sculpture lasts until it has been completely melted. Other sculptures in the rotunda by Urs Fischer fabricated in wax include a melted down set of plane seats, an office chair on wheels, and a headless man’s body in a blue blazer, light blue button-down shirt, and khaki pants with wax dripping down from it.

The main gallery spaces, which cover about 75,000 square feet, are splintered off the sides of the rotunda on three-floors, similar to the Guggenheim in New York. The current exhibition features a stable of artists from the collection but no specific theme or cohesion to bring them together. The most interesting exhibition was by David Hammons, a collection of familiar objects and sculptures reinterpreted and reinvented.

One other feature I was impressed with was the vitrines with handsome wood frames and a single object in each.

I was fascinated with the impressive architectural details at every turn such as the marvelous, intricate staircases, the beveled, round glass ceiling, the mosaic tile floors, and the clean curves of the rotunda. Taking photos at odd angles was a blast and the results are below.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t get a peek at the restaurant because the entrance is blocked and only open to people who have a reservation.

Bourse de Commerce

2 Rue de Viarmes, 75001

https://www.pinaultcollection.com/en