The polished aluminium piece hangs in the centre of a glass pavilion that echoes Philip Johnson’s Glass House in Connecticut. It is an intimate setting directly under another Bourgeois work McKillen acquired for La Coste, The Couple, 2007-2009. Patrick McKillen – Paddy to his friends – is recounting this story sitting at what will be any art and food aficionado’s most coveted dining table. It was only after Bourgeois’ children saw the footage of their mother talking to Nouvel about the project, some months later, that Gorovoy called McKillen to tell him they had changed their minds. ‘After that, Jerry thought the estate would want it to go to the highest bidder, which meant it was way out of my reach,’ says McKillen. Louise was very frail, but she lit up talking to Jean about the idea.’īourgeois died before the deal to bring I Do, I Undo, I Redo to La Coste was sealed. ‘Jean was literally on the next flight to see her,’ says McKillen. A few months passed after Nouvel’s proposition was sent to Bourgeois and then Gorovoy got in touch to say she was very keen on the idea. It will be a feat of engineering when complete. Nouvel’s idea was ambitious – to excavate an area of hillside high up on the estate overlooking the Puy-Sainte-Réparade valley and rebuild the shape of the hill over the top of the Bourgeois towers with an undulating concrete roof. Nouvel has been involved with Château La Coste since McKillen bought the property in 2002 he originally advised on a master plan for the estate and designed the pair of high-tech cylindrical steel chai de vinification buildings, unveiled in 2008. McKillen, collaborative by nature, called French architect Jean Nouvel and asked him to propose an environment to house the towers. ‘Jerry liked the idea, but he didn’t think there was any chance of it happening.’ I suggested bringing them to France and installing them at La Coste,’ he continues. He told me they were in storage and that Louise wanted them to go to a museum, but it was unlikely any museum would be able to display them permanently. ‘I called Jerry to ask whether I could pop by and see him to buy a print for my friend and, while I was there, I asked him what had happened to those Tate towers. ‘I was in New York for a friend’s 50th birthday,’ recalls McKillen. Given she had been so happy with the idea, McKillen felt empowered to suggest another. It was McKillen’s radical idea of installing the piece on the water that sold the deal to Bourgeois. You are greeted by the giant arachnoid sculpture rising from the reflecting pool in front of the Tadao Ando-designed Art Centre (housing the main reception and a restaurant) when you first enter the estate, which McKillen opened to the public in 2011. McKillen was already well acquainted with Bourgeois’ long-time assistant Jerry Gorovoy, having bought a Crouching Spider – the first in a series of six and the only one in France – for Château La Coste some years earlier. In the year before Bourgeois’ death, Irish property developer and businessman Patrick McKillen went to visit her in New York to propose transporting the towers to her native France and installing them at McKillen’s 600-acre estate Château La Coste, an organic winery and expansive art and architecture park in the heart of Provence. I Do, I Undo, I Redo, an installation consisting of three 9m-tall steel towers that visitors could climb, created for the inaugural Tate Modern Turbine Hall exhibition exactly a decade earlier, had been packed away in storage since it was taken down. By submitting your information you agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy and are aged 16 or over.Īt the time of Louise Bourgeois’ death in May 2010 a question mark hung over where one of the artist’s largest, most ambitious works would end up.
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