An American in Paris

By Thomas A. Sancton/Paris

With its towers, gaps and controlled riot of swooping curves, the new American Center in Paris unmistakably bears the mark of its designer, California architect Frank Gehry. Gehry's first famous building was his Santa Monica home -- a modest Dutch colonial, transformed so provocatively with corrugated metal, glass and chain link fence that it actually drew gunfire from an irate neighbor. Ever since, Gehry has specialized in the tumbling, disjointed style known as deconstructivism. Though more conservative than his usual projects, the Paris building is still a characteristic and handsome achievement. Within this stylish envelope, the architect has accommodated a theater, a cinema, art and dance studios, performance spaces and apartments. There's only one problem: now that it has built its fabulous new facility, the center has little money with which to operate it.

When the building officially opens its doors to the public this week, the signs of disarray will be all too visible. The ground-floor restaurant, bookstore and travel agency are concrete shells with dangling wires; in recession-gripped Paris, the center has found no suitable concessionaires. The language classrooms are also empty, since the center canceled all its English courses last March. And all but two of the 27 artist-in-residence apartments are unfinished, because expected corporate sponsorship didn't materialize. "I went and looked at the building a few weeks ago, and I wanted to cry," says Gehry, "because this is a building designed for a lot of people to use, and it was pretty empty."

Founded 63 years ago, the American Center is a privately supported cultural haven that has presented the creme de la creme of contemporary American artists, writers, filmmakers, dancers and musicians to Parisian audiences. Over the years it has been a hangout for Ernest Hemingway and Gertrude Stein and has served as host of performances by the likes of John Cage, Samuel Beckett, Philip Glass, Steve Lacy and Merce Cunningham. In 1987 the center sold its dilapidated headquarters on the Boulevard Raspail and embarked on an ambitious building program in the Bercy region of eastern Paris. And that's where all the trouble really began.

With the $40 million they received for the old real estate, the center's executive director Henry Pillsbury and co-chairman Judith Pisar decided to put virtually the entire amount into a new building. At the same time, they launched a fund-raising campaign intended to create a $25 million endowment to cover the center's operating expenses. But the recession of the early '90s dried up donations. The fund-raising drive has brought in only $10 million so far, of which $4 million has yet to be paid. The annual budget of the center is expected to be about $5 million.

The funding shortfall was exacerbated by questionable management decisions. Several million dollars were spent on high-priced consultants and on fitting out a temporary headquarters that later had to be torn down. The financial problems became so severe that in 1992 the entire four-member programming staff was fired. It's hard to have a program of cultural events if there is no one to plan them. The goal now, says co-chairman Frederick Henry, is to "start modestly and gradually grow into the building." A scaled-down series of exhibitions, concerts and conferences was finally announced this spring.

Laid-off staff members speak harshly of Pillsbury's and Pisar's "mismanagement." A former visual-arts curator, Michael Tarrantino, says that "Pillsbury's fantastic at greeting people, but he's not a manager." Says another ex-curator, Denise Luccioni: "There was no budget. I was just supposed to work, and we were told, 'We'll find the budget."' Even as the financial crisis was coming to a head in 1992, says Luccioni, the board of directors, uninformed about the money problems, was debating questions like "If you say American Center, does that imply Mexico and Canada?" Outsiders are also critical. "To build such a place when there was no money to make it run is simply irresponsible," says a curator at the Pompidou Center, Paris' museum for modern art. "You don't buy a Rolls-Royce if you can't even pay for the gasoline."

Pisar and Pillsbury adamantly reject the charges of incompetence. "When we conceived this building, economic times were different," Pisar says. "And the board approved everything. There was no dissension about the building or about our vision." Says Pillsbury: "It's not that we overspent; it's just that it's been a great struggle, as it has for every institution." Pillsbury, an heir to the flour fortune and a sometime actor and poet, will soon step down after 27 years as executive director to make "room for new leadership," as he puts it. Pisar seems headed for an emeritus position. It has been left to Frederick Henry to lead the center through this transition period.

Henry has implemented a strategy of institutional alliances with other major cultural organizations that will allow the center to draw on their expertise and share the costs of producing shows. He has also set up a 24-member special committee, comprising mostly American curators, academics and fund raisers, to develop the center's programming on the basis of such collaborations. One of the first fruits of this approach is the the center's inaugural exhibition, "Pure Beauty," a group show of seven California artists curated by the Museum of Contemporary Art of Los Angeles.

As if the Gehry building had not caused the American Center enough financial trouble, it has also created an aesthetic controversy -- but not the one anybody would have expected. Parisians think the building is too ... Parisian. Critics have complained that it is not bold and Californian enough. Gehry "has abandoned a bit of his wild, spontaneous quality in order to cater to a Parisian norm," charges Francois Chaslin, editor of the influential monthly Architecture d'Aujourd'hui. "The result is more ordinary, less powerful than his other buildings."

"I have been questioned as to why I didn't do a real Gehry building," Gehry says. Zoning laws and the tightness of the space reined in his exuberance, but Gehry freely admits that he sought to echo Parisian architectural styles. "I think it has something to do with using the stone," he explains. "I chose French limestone, which is the common material. The zinc roof is the normal zinc that they use. The shapes were inspired by what I call Paris' cleavage, the articulation between the roof forms you see all over Paris. I suppose I am fitting into my fantasies of old Paris, and I probably look regressive and conservative to them." But the real test of this building, Gehry insists, is how well it will function once it's up and running: "I am just waiting for the building to come to life. I keep saying, 'Plug it in!"'

With reporting by Victoria Foote-Greenwell/Paris and Daniel S. Levy/New York