A Square in the City

Carré d'Art is a bright and spacious building designed by Norman Foster, and located in the heart of Nîmes on the former Roman Forum. The Museum of Contemporary Art and the multimedia library can be found there, as well as a café.

Until 1952, a neoclassical theater stood opposite the Maison Carrée. Inaugurated in 1800 and listed as a historical monument for its colonnade in 1949, it was at the heart of Nîmes' cultural life before it was destroyed by arson.

The 1952 fire was caused by an opera singer seeking revenge. Only the portico and the Ionic style colonnade survived the blaze. The theater remained in a state of ruin and the site remained vacant until the project to create Carré d'Art began.

In 1983, an architectural competition for a cultural building, based on the model of the Centre Pompidou (a museum of modern art in Paris), was launched in Nîmes. 12 international architects participated. These included Frank Gehry, Jean Nouvel, and Norman Foster, who went on to win the competition.

A British architect born in 1935, Lord Norman Foster created his studio Foster + Partners in 1967. He's known for designing constructions such as the Reichstag in Berlin (1999), the Millennium Bridge in London (2001), and the Millau Viaduct in the south of France (2004). 

The preservation and integration into the project of the ancient theater's columns was the subject of intense debates. Foster designed a model with this in mind, but they weren't retained. They were finally moved to the Caissargues highway rest area in 1987.

When Foster first came to Nîmes, he explored the city on foot, interested in the characteristics of this southern city, its architecture, and its light. With the help of his camera and a sketchbook, he took many notes and made sketches of his impressions.

Foster sought to clear the space around the Maison Carrée to devote as much of it as possible to pedestrians.  Between the two buildings, the redesigned square offers a new visual continuum, and provides living areas, cultural spaces, performance stages, and café terraces.

With a total surface area of 219,500 square feet (20,400 square m), Carré d'Art extends over nine levels, four above ground and five below. The library, museum storerooms, and technical areas are located beneath the ground floor, as Foster revealed, "just like in a ship."

On October 3, 1988, Nîmes was hit by a historic flood. Over 132,000,000 gallons (500,000 cubic m) of water rushed into the pit of the construction site, where four levels had already been excavated, spared the Maison Carrée from irreversible damage.  The original project of the building, will be redesigned and raised on a concrete belt.

Robert Calle and Jean Bousquet, the mayor of Nîmes, who initiated the project, inaugurated the building in the presence of Jacques Toubon, the minister of culture. Calle, the museum's first director, was a renowned oncologist and a great art collector.

In the square, newly redesigned by Foster, the audience attended the opening of the museum and its first exhibition L'Ivresse du Réel–l'Objet dans l'Art du XXe Siècle (The Thrill of Reality–Objects in 20th Century Art), which welcomed over 20,000 visitors.