200 BIG BANG

Both are pyrotechnicians: Architect Frank Gehry deconstructs with his construction; Cai Guo-Qiang uses gunpowder in his explosive art. When the New York-based artist bought a weekend home in New Jersey, he called his pal to renovate the 1920s horse farm. Flying carpet titanium roofs, glass and sequoia volumes, an explosion of shapes and materials

At first glance, a collaboration between the world-famous architect Frank Gehry and the equally prominent artist Cai Guo-Qiang seems downright dangerous. There’s the risk of a titan clash of egos and visions. Yet only some serious creative fireworks were set off when Gehry designed a weekend home in New Jersey for (and with) Cai. The Chinese painter and performance artist was awarded the 2012 Praemium Imperiale and the Golden Lion at the 1999 Venice Biennale. He’s best known for his public installations that he calls ‘outdoor explosion events’. At these spectacles, gunpowder, his signature material, becomes an artistic medium as seen in the dazzling pyrotechnics display broadcast worldwide for the opening ceremonies of the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing. His house is also an explosion of volumes and materials, not surprisingly since Gehry is the maestro of deconstructivism, a medium which he’s constantly changing. Look no further than the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao or the Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris. Cai’s retreat is nestled in the bucolic, small town of Chester, New Jersey, a solid hour’s commute from Manhattan. The artist has lived in New York since 1995 and has a studio designed in 2015 by Rem Koolhaas, a founding partner of the acclaimed firm OMA. Chester, a world away from the Big Apple, is reached by train passing by the industrial swamplands of the Meadowlands, Newark’s abandoned factories, and leafy college towns before arriving at the county seat of Morristown, a RevolutionaryWar stronghold. (In The Sopranos, Tony Soprano dreams that Morristown is his final resting place). The home studio is a converted 1920s horse farm which Cai bought from an Olympian equestrian. Soon after he bought the property in 2011, the work began, a close collaboration between the artist and architect as well as Gehry’s former student Trattie Davies. The result reflects the owner’s personality – boisterous yet modest, exuberant but, in the end, serene. The stone and blond wood pair well, while the large windows allow light to enter, highlighting the interior’s simplicity and rigor. The old horse barn has been transformed into a 1,300-square-metre studio, large enough that a truck can be driven inside for unloading artistic materials. The stables will eventually be converted into archives. Once the adjacent hay loft is taken down, the space will open up, allowing for a huge exhibition area with soaring ceilings. This will permit Cai to show his large-scale pieces, such as those from his recent solo show “The Spirit of Painting” at Madrid’s Museo del Prado). The home and the studio are connected. The artist had long dreamed of bringing under one roof his work and family life and he achieved it with style. He, his wife Hong HongWu and their two children escape to this country haven that one day the artist plans to transform into a foundation open to the public. Enormous windows, sequoia wood and stone combine gracefully in a cluster of volumes - some restored and some new - for an overall deconstructivist look, Gehry’s trademark. «The best advice I’ve received is to be yourself», the Pritzker Prize-winning architect said to ArchDaily. «Find your own way because then you’re the only expert. Some people might not like what you do, but still, you’re the only expert». Gehry used