This is the first sketch of the project, drawn by Jean Nouvel in 2006, on a train taking us to London to visit a building under construction. The question of context, so critical to Jean Nouvel, which had determined the architectural concept for the project in this historical neighbourhood of London, would present itself in a new way—for a more distant site, on the desert shores of Saadiyat Island in Abu Dhabi.

 

Jean Nouvel, pencil in hand, tells me about his recent meeting with the director of the Guggenheim, who shared the Emiratis' ambitious plan to create for their capital a series of cultural institutions, including a “classical art museum,” which would be entrusted to him. Six months later, we would learn that this museum would become the Louvre Abu Dhabi.

 

Beyond the sketch, primitive as it was, there are Jean Nouvel's words, precise and essential. They cut to the core, and these first pencil marks, accompanying his discourse, already contain the entire project in its essence and in the expression of its concept:

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            The island within the island / The museum district / The dome and its microclimate  

            Its belonging to a place, to its geography and its history, to its culture

 

All is said and yet everything remains to be done. To be designed and to be set to music. With two key words: “Geometry and Light.”

 

A vast task of interpretation, orchestration and realization.

            How to invent a “reversed archeology”?

            How to create a “rain of light”?

 

How to stay as close as possible to the idea

            Interpret, transcribe, translate

            Possess the subject, be possessed by it

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How to find the right vocabulary

            Writing, drawing,

            Measurement, rhythm,

            Breath, respiration,

            Emotion​

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How to integrate the local culture

            Be immersed, understand, reinterpret…

 

And then,

How to assemble all the parameters of production

            The team, individual and collective talents

            The experts, specialists of all kinds

            The tools, both empirical and digital

 

How to carry it out

            Research today's materials

            Develop prototypes

            Identify the right companies

            Know how to build 

 

More than ten years of gestation, creation and craftsmanship to finally give birth to the Louvre of the desert, which also weeps its rain of sunlight.