On the way to the Tête d’Or park, all you had to do was stick your head under the large glass roof to marvel at the Choulans mammoth or be surprised by the skeleton of a whale. «The Guimet Museum, all old Lyonnais keep a precious memory of it during Sunday walks!», says Nathalie Perrin-Gilbert, cultural assistant to the mayor of Lyon. An emblematic place, which remained empty and closed for fifteen years, and which, in this autumn, offers itself a new life.
In September, this imposing building in the city’s 6th arrondissement was refurbished to once again welcome the public: it will be one of the key venues for the Contemporary Art Biennale (1), before being transformed into a space for cultural experimentation, between street art exhibitions and immersive theater sessions. «It was necessary to maintain the city’s heritage, but also and above all to give it back to the people of Lyon! », rejoices the chosen one.
5,500 square meters rehabilitated
Because the Guimet Museum has been a landmark since the beginning of the 20th century. Dreamed up by Émile Guimet (industrialist and collector) and inaugurated in 1913 on the prestigious Boulevard des Belges, it presented pieces from extra-European ethnology, the natural sciences and the pontifical missionary works. In the early 2000s, the department sold it to the city of Lyon, which then had its rich collections transferred to the new Musée des confluences.
While the building is gathering dust, a series of projects have been aborted due to the scale of the work – such as the “Dance Workshops” – until the proposal by the Biennale teams. Since the beginning of the summer, more than half of these 9,000 square meters have been the subject of extensive cleaning and upgrading to electricity, accessibility and safety standards, thanks to a municipal budget of 500 000 €.
A popular space
The place retains a raw appearance, which the seven artists invited by the Biennale will take advantage of, in particular to showcase their audiovisual installations which can be observed by more than 400 people at the same time. “It’s a space that people have acclaimed when booking, says Nathalie Perrin-Gilbert, out of love or nostalgia! »
Since the announcement of its reopening, the partners are also scrambling to integrate future programming, completes the cultural assistant. «By 2025, the idea is that the Guimet Museum can be easily transformed to accommodate different artistic experiences, and that we can imagine, together, a sensible and sustainable destiny. »