Description of project by Instituto de Arquitectura de Euskadi
"Eileen Gray: E.1027" is the new exhibition of the Basque Institute of Architecture, an exhibition that brings the figure of the architect and designer closer through her first and most important work: her summer villa on the Côte d'Azur.
The exhibition, which will be open until 10 October, recreates on a 1:1 scale the main bedroom of the E.1027 house, furnished with pieces designed by Gray herself and reproduced with original materials.
"Eileen Gray: E.1027" is accompanied by a program of activities ranging from children's workshops to summer cinema sessions.
Pioneering. Innovative. Multifaceted. This Thursday, 27 May, the Basque Institute of Architecture opened an exhibition dedicated to the Irish architect and designer Eileen Gray. Focusing on her first and most important work, the E.1027 house on the coast of the south of France, the Institute of Architecture wants to rescue the figure of the pioneer of the modern movement.
The exhibition reflects on the many facets of Eileen Gray, from her well-known work as a furniture designer to her recently recovered architectural work, the villa E.1027. The exhibition is curated by Wilfried Wang, architect, and professor at the University of Texas, and Carolina Leite, research architect, and professor at the University of Porto.
Eileen Gray: E.1027' focuses on the most significant and essential space of the 1929 villa: it is the master bedroom, recreated on a 1:1 scale with replicas of the furniture produced with original materials. In this way, the Basque Institute of Architecture aims to bring the work and values of this architect closer to the general public, in a journey from the global to the specific, to understand the importance of Eileen Gray as a pioneer of modernity also in the architectural field.
Born in the Irish town of Enniscorthy in 1878, Eileen Gray was ahead of her time. She trained at the Slade School of Fine Art in London and in 1902 moved to Paris, where she lived until she died in 1976. There she specialized in the art of Japanese lacquer and it was there that she opened her first gallery and produced her first works, ranging from paintings and interior designs to her well-known furniture made from industrial materials. When he met the architect Jean Badovici, he became interested in architecture and in 1926, in a self-taught manner, he drew up the first plans for his first anthological construction: the villa E.1027, which he designed in Roquebrune, on the coast of southern France.
The summer villa, in the modern style, made Gray one of the pioneers of this movement, causing even Le Corbusier himself to be envious. "She is usually presented as a secondary character, but the quality of Gray's designs is on a par with the greatest masters of modernity", emphasized the director of the Basque Institute of Architecture, José Ángel Medina.
Completed in 1929, the house was designed and paid for by Gray. A simple, functional, and rational construction open to the Mediterranean, it was a manifesto for his later creations. Gray studied concepts such as space, the course of light, and orientation to give life to her first project as an architect. She also looked at the habitability of the house to design her furniture, pieces that remain an icon of the twentieth century to this day.
The house was vandalized by Le Corbusier - who painted murals on its walls against Gray's wishes - looted during World War II, abandoned and subsequently forgotten. In the year 2000, it was declared a Historical Monument in France and acquired by the administration, which began the process of restoration; now, the exhibition that the Architecture Institute is hosting until 10 October helps to bring it back to memory.
A global tour
Eileen Gray: E.1027' is a vindication of the different and advanced views on architecture and design, and also a commitment to making the great professionals of the sector visible. "Gray was ahead of her time, she put forward ideas that are still in vindication today, such as the flexibility of housing and its adaptation to the needs and life stages of those who live in it, and she put these concepts into practice by hybridizing architectural elements and furniture", said Pedro Jauregui, the Basque Government's Deputy Minister for Housing.
It comes to Spain for the first time after having been designed for the Mebane Hall in Austin (Texas) and having passed through the Akademie der Künste in Berlin and the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Oporto. This new adaptation curated by Wilfried Wang and Carolina Leite seeks to underline the role of this room as the keyspace for understanding the house and the importance of its conception as a total work of art. "The home is not only a reflection of our practical needs, but it also reflects our cultural values and beliefs, as well as the historical realities to which they belong. The home is a mirror of how we understand our intimate and social reality", stressed Harkaitz Millán, the Gipuzkoa Provincial Council's deputy for Culture.
After painstaking research by the O'Neil Ford Chair in Architecture at the University of Texas, using photographs and documents from the period, it has been possible to recover and reconstruct all the original finishes, fixtures, and furnishings of the master bedroom. The public is thus allowed to immerse themselves in the exact environment that Gray configured for this space, which has more than 25 unique pieces, courtesy of the universities of Austin and Oporto. In addition, there are two pieces produced by the Instituto de Arquitectura de Euskadi that complete the installation.
Also on display are the processes and results of the research carried out, as well as several original plates from the magazine L'Architecture Vivante and the reprint of its monographic issue, which first published this project in 1929. "In 2015, Wilfried Wang challenged his students to contribute to the house reconstruction effort, which was underway in France at the time. The object of the study was the master bedroom, as it could be conceived, in his words, as the core of his architectural conception. The result was the large-scale reconstruction of the master bedroom and all its contents, including 14 unknown pieces of furniture designed for this space", explained the curator Carolina Leite.
The exhibition is completed with two preliminary rooms offering a journey from the global to the concrete through the era and the figure of Eileen Gray, with the help of collaborators such as the National Museum of Ireland: in the first room, a collection of audiovisual documents on the era and the life of Eileen Gray is projected; the second serves as a prelude to the 1:1 scale reproduction, to explain to the general public who Eileen Gray was through some of her best-known pieces.
