La Villette's Science Museum Opens as 'Museum of the Accident'

On March 13, 1986, the first phase of the Cité des sciences et des techniques at La Villette was inaugurated. Chantal Béret noted that this opening was part of a long series of inaugurations for a vast architectural project including the Grande Halle, Zénith, Géode, Parc with its Maisons and Folies, and the Cité de la musique. The complex represents the conversion of a former financial scandal into festivities celebrating the ideology of Progress in an era that no longer believes in it. Paul Virilio reminded that the successes of science and technology also inaugurated a series of catastrophes fed to the media daily, questioning whether this is a museum of science or a museum of the accident.