A series of transparent volumes opens the museum towards downtown Joliette and the Assomption River.
PROJECT Musée d?art de Joliette, Joliette, Quebec

ARCHITECT Les Architectes FABG

TEXT David Theodore

PHOTOS Steve Montpetit
Joliette sits about 50 kilometres northeast of Montreal and 10 kilometres north of the St. Lawrence. It?s home to the internationally acclaimed Festival de Lanaudière, an annual summer celebration of classical music. When you drive in by car?and there is little chance that you?ll arrive by any other means?you?re greeted by a bright, cantilevered box that slides out over a podium of white concrete steps. This is the sparkling new addition to the Musée d?art de Joliette (MAJ). You can?t miss it. Éric Gauthier, FIRAC, of Les Architectes FABG, which designed the two-storey addition to an existing structure known as ?the bunker,? says that the aim was to open up the museum to the community. Annie Gauthier, the MAJ?s director, came to him with a vision to make the institution a bigger part of everyday life in the city. That mandate follows a worldwide focus on how museum design can impact the visitor experience. In Manhattan, for instance, the Whitney Museum has moved from Marcel Breuer?s inward-looking 1966 building to an airy, glass-faced Renzo Piano building attached to the High Line. ?With the addition in Joliette, the idea is to attract the public and to bring the art works forward to the community, so that people participate not just in a museum...