Smoked Meat / Published on December 17, 2020
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DAN SERGIO HANGANU,
The Art of the Architect
Photo Bernard Brault, archives la presse
« ARCHITECTURE IS SERIOUS, IT’S WHAT STANDS WITH TIME. »
Dan Hanganu, the once-young Romanian who dreamed of being an artist and then became the great architect who shaped the city of Montreal with the expression of architectural language at its best. The master architect who knew how to play with forms like a poet plays with words, passed away in 2017. Remains of him, his achievements that have become emblems of Québécois urbanity.
Incisive and gourmet questionnaire addressed to designers and architects of Montreal, written by Madeleine Champagne and Anne Darche, published in INTÉRIEURS 40, AUTUMN 2007 and updated in 2021 for INT. design by Juli Pisano (in COLOR).
BORN IN ROMANIA
In Iasi, in 1939. And grew up in Transylvania, surrounded by soldiers and dreaming of, one day, becoming a sculptor. He studied architecture in Bucharest in 1961, before enrolling at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris.
WELCOME TO CANADA
In 1970, he immigrates in Canada. He lands in Toronto, then falls for Montréal.
HE OPENS HIS ARCHITECTURE FIRM…
Dan Hanganu architectes, and moulds the mood of Montréal, Québec City and more, from then on and forever!
JEWELS IN THE CITY AND BEYOND…
The Archives Center of the National Library and Archives of Québec in Montréal, the head office of Cirque du Soleil, the Théâtre du Nouveau-Monde, the Abbey Church of Saint-Benoit-du-Lac, the Archeology Museum Pointe-à-Callière, the UQÀM design pavilion, the École des Hautes Études Commerciales (HEC), the Marc-Favreau library… the list goes on!
The H.E.C. seen from inside, Montreal, Canada, 1996. Photo: Marc Cramer.
The warm Abbey Church of Saint-Benoît-du-Lac, Saint-Benoît-du-Lac, Quebec, 1994. Photo: Michel Brunelle.
The soaring Pointe-à-Callière Archeology and History Museum, Montreal, Canada, 1992. Photo: Raphael Thibodeau.
The new poetic Marc-Favreau library, Montreal, Canada, 2013.
KUDOS ABOUND!
Nearly ten awards of excellence from the Ordre des Architectes du Québec, the Paul-Émile Borduas award from the Government of Quebec, the Sam-Lapointe Carrière award from the Institut de design Montréal, four medals from the Governor General of Canada, an honorary doctorate in architecture from Laval University, an officer title of the Ordre national du Québec, et cetera, et cetera!
Website of the Ordre National du Québec here
ROMANIAN, RUSSIAN, ENGLISH,
French, Italian, German, y un poco Spanish … he mastered languages and loved their histories!
HE DID NOT EAT SMOKED MEATS THOUDH…
What can we say … nobody’s perfect (we forgive him!)
ALL FOR ONE…
He used to dream standing before an audience dressed as d’Artagnan. The hidden face of his unique and profoundly artistic personality!
A SCULPTOR FIRST AND FOREMOST
The dream: Scene 1: Transylvania … his childhood is greatly influenced by his dream of becoming a sculptor.
Scene 2: “My aunt Rodica Ciobanu was a architect and as a young kid I was fascinated by her.” Starts studying architecture at age 15. Six years later, he starts practices the second oldest profession on Earth.
“As soon a man built his first house, he de facto became an architect.”, the master would say.
Scene 3: “My military father’s discipline and the solidity of the stone mural of my natal village forged and inspired me profoundly…”
HELLO MONTRÉAL
“It was snowing when I came to Montreal for the first time. I was obsessed with gravity. I loved the walls, solid structures.”
I only have one regret:“stone no longer exists nowadays…”
Musée Pointe-à-Callière, Montréal, Canada. Dan Hanganu architectes in collaboration with Provencher_Roy architectes. Photo credit: Raphaël Thibodeau.
MONTRÉAL A-LIST HOMES?
“Those on Baille Street, in front of the Canadian Centre of Architecture. Walls made of gaps. Strong and primitive. A beautiful stone, beautiful proportions.”
Oh yesssss … he also wanted to save Silo No 5 with all his love and passion for his profession! Dan had imagined a forest nested above the silos, a public piazza and an observatory.
Dan had imagined a forest nested above the silos, a public piazza and an observatory.
“I love Montréal for its lights at minus 30 °F!” »
His wife: An architect! His friends: Architects! His hobby: Architecture!
“I have no other hobbies… I don’t play the accordion. Architecture gives me everything I need.”
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| Musée de l’ingéniosité J. Armand Bombardier – Valcourt , Québec, Canada / Crédit photo : © Stéphane Groleau |
“I prefer the transparency of the construction site to the completion of the building. Imagination is then still intact.”
“When I get hit by the blues, I run over to the HEC and I feel at home!”
He was welcomed with open arms every time.
He designed building with good vibes…
The imposing facade of the Hautes Études Commerciales, Montréal, Canada, 1996. Dan Hanganu architectes.
Photos: © Richard Poissant.
“I am the servant of those who live there. I hate castle houses with their BMWs in the garage. These are no longer architectural designs – only results of construction! “
SILENCE OR MUSIC TO DRAW?
“Good question! Both.”
THE MOUSE OR THE PEN?
“The pen. Hands down. The computer comes after … otherwise, poetry is lost.”
“We have lost the innate gestures of architecture: symbolism. The fundamental syntax of its kind…”
Bibliothèque Marc-Favreau, Montréal, Canada, 2013.
Photos: © Michel Brunelle.
HE ADORED…
Constantin Brancusi, angels (everywhere in his studio), horses and Botero…
POST SCRIPTUM:
The shoemaker was well-shod – he lived in a home of his own doing in Montréal and in an 1836 Loyalist house in the countryside in the Eastern Townships. The best of both worlds!
HEAR HIM SPEAK OF ARCHITECTURE AND LOVE…
In 2007, Maxime Giroux and Frédérick Pelletier made a short documentary about Dan Hanganu’s architecture and work. Hear him speak for himself of his role and field.
IN MEMORIAM TESTIMONIES
WORD FROM GINETTE GADOURY,
COPRESIDENT OF AGENCE PID
On October 5, 2017, a bright star named Dan passed away at the age of 78. 10 years earlier, Madeleine Champagne and Anne Darche met with architect Dan Sergio Hanganu in his Montreal studio. They were interviewing the man for the Smoked Meat column of INTÉRIEURS magazine. They remember that it was a cold winter day and that Dan greeted them, with a solid build, surrounded by many little white angels perched here and there in a place a little messy, but oh-so welcoming, a real cave of ’Ali Baba…
Was he dressed in corduroy and wool, you will ask? Those who knew him will answer: “Surely” Trademark Hanganu clothing:)
His leitmotif: Architecture is serious, it’s what remains. And what remains, among others, so alive and so touching, is his abbey church of Saint-Benoît-du-Lac.
A tour de force, the abbey church of all the buildings of the monastery is the one which is the most faithful reflection of the monastic order. A veritable “monastic workshop”, the abbey church designed by Hanganu is strong, luminous, timeless and identified on the outside by a tower housing the bells which call the monks for the eight daily services. She is superb.
Rest in peace, Dan… and thank you.
WORD FROM GARY MICHAEL CONRATH, DESIGNER
“I’m not working on architecture, I’m working on architecture as a language, and I think you have a language. You can use it, you know, for normal purposes, and you speak in prose. And if you are good at that, you speak a wonderful prose. And if you are really good, you can be a poet.”
— Mies van der Rohe: The Difficult Art of Being Simple.
“I think this text is most appropriate to highlight the work of Dan Hanganu. He created a precise and recognizable architectural language, a rare and deserving compliment that few designers in the built world manage to do. The coherence of his architectural language confers a notable dignity through his achievements which enhance the quality of our existence.”
WORD FROM ODILE HÉNAULT, ARCHITECTURE CRITIC, CANADIAN CENTER OF ARCHITECTURE
“Dan was a being of immense vitality, an extraordinary sensitivity and a capacity for wonder which will have nourished him all his life. He has made an exceptional contribution to the transformation of Quebec architecture, despite the increasingly difficult obstacle course that increasingly arduous task of practicing the profession today.. ”
WORD FROM GILLES PRUD’HOMME, ARCHITECTE
“How to describe Hanganu other than as a great architect, a true man with strong convictions and a righteous morality? His whole existence was devoted to architecture and this life, inseparable from this profession, as he called it, remains linked to giving and generosity.”
WORD FROM KENNETH FRAMPTON, ARCHITECT
“In all of his projects, Hanganu has asserted himself as a model maker. The various types of large, street-facing ladders he proposes for Montreal are intelligent and responsible contributions to the city’s urban fabric. The creative position he assumes is rational and ethical. ”
WORD FROM ROGER-BRUNO RICHARD, PROFESSOR, UNIVERSITÉ DE MONTRÉAL, FACULTÉ DE L’AMÉNAGEMENT
“An architecture marked by the lyrical sobriety that was peculiar to Hanganu. Dan would establish a clear and categorical rule, generated mainly by function and context, then he would subtly apply himself to virtuously break the rule he had established and this is what gives warmth and rhythm to his achievements.”
