Few buildings in the world could boast the notoriety of being recognised by just a small segment of its structural fabric. So revolutionary was the Centre Georges Pompidou (Museum of Modern Art, rue Beaubourg) when completed twenty-four years ago that its provocative inside-out personality became synonymous the world over with "avant-garde" architecture. There is hardly a shopping mall, cinema complex or sports centre built since 1980 from Australia to Athens that has not adopted in part the visual vocabulary invented by the Centre Pompidou.
To Paris, a city that is soberly clad in stone, the Centre was a revelation. It is the building which transcended air conditioning funnels into modern sculpture, escalators into kinetic works of art. 
Having said that, my first impressions of the place when I was an eighteen year old art student were dire. The plastic escalator tubes were stifling hot, the building was grubby and the exhibition spaces were poky and unimaginative. It had the feel of a discount department store. 
 

Which aisle for postcards please?

$135 million has gone into making the Pompidou year 2000 ready. Gorgeous and sparkling, bigger and better the Centre opened its doors on the first day of the new millennium as promised. 
Of the original designing team Richard Rogers, Renzo Piano and Ove Arup only Renzo Piano was officially involved in the two year restoration working with Jean-François Bodin.
 

Part of the dazzling facade now freshly painted (restoration work began as early as 1994 on the facade). The striking colours of the exterior mask the workings of the interior. BLUE signifies air conditioning GREEN : fluids, conducting water YELLOW : hides the electrical cables RED : communications and security (cables for elevators and fire control etc. )  The priority was to make the functional and mundane - beautiful.

MAIN CHANGES : 

There is now one main entrance only, off the square.

The permanent Mnam/Cci (Musée national d'art moderne-Centre de création industrielle) collections now occupy the entire 3rd and 4th floors, an expansion of 4,000 m² compared to the previous area and a total area of 14,000 m² (7,000 x 2). Access is  from the 3rd floor. 
The historical collections are located on the 4th floor and the contemporary collections on the 3rd. 
 

Twentieth century art - already 'historical'. One of the works of art on display on the 4th floor's newly renovated galleries. Pablo Ruiz Picasso, Femme nue couchée. 12-August, 2-October/1936. 130.5 x 162 cm. Oil on canvas. Musée National d'Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris

The 5th floor is being  used for temporary exhibitions and has been expanded by more than 1,000 m² .
Also on the 5th floor are two areas of 2,500 m² and 1,000 m² forming 'project continuity' and there is a snazzy new cafeteria and restaurant up here with panoramic views over Paris.

Also new is a gallery reserved permanently for photography exhibitions.

Above all,  the entire Forum area has been made more user-friendly with public services and library access (Bibliothèque publique d'information) reorganized over two floors. 

You'll also be pleased to hear those famous 'caterpillar" escalators have been brought up to date. It was a grey and rainy day when it opened and the ride was comfortable. I asked if visitors would still swelter in July and was assured that the Summer of 2000 would be 'no sweat'. 
© ARTnewsroom.com

Richard Rogers attacks new look Pompidou centre    Richard Rogers, the architect of Paris's modernist landmark the Pompidou centre, launched a bitter attack Wednesday on the  centre's new look, saying his original conception had been betrayed.    Built in 1977, the National Centre for Art and Culture has just re-opened  after a major two-year overhaul costing 135 million euros (dollars).     But speaking on French radio, Rogers said the "the building has been  totally destroyed as a building for the people -- and for purely financial  reasons."    Rogers said the main reason for the centre's popular success had been the  exterior escalators, which visitors could enter without paying, and which  allowed "a continuity between the piazza and the facade, with people moving on  the horizontal and vertical planes."    However because visitors now have to pay to take the escalator, "the  initial concept of a building offering the freest access possible is totally  destroyed."    Rogers said that because access to the centre's library must by statute be non-paying, the new design incorporates a separate interior escalator to serve  it, but one which "totally breaks up the fluidity of the different levels."    "It is clear to me that ... it was not for reasons of organising the flow of people that they created a second entry, but because they want people to  pay to go up on the (outside) escalator to see the street.     "It is a trick to make people pay," he said.    Rogers said he had been consulted during the re-design but had not had a  direct hand.    A spokesman for the centre said he was surprised by Rogers' comments and  suggested he might have come in person to see how the public is reacting.    Last week-end, when entry to French museums was free, an estimated 80,000  people visited the Pompidou centre. afp

This month's installation by an Italian Artist [sic] nobody knows when it goes !