Glück und Freundschaft

Dear Joseph,

During the last year I didn’t have so many occasions to practice my French due to Corona. Please excuse me writing English instead, it is much easier for me.

Some years before you were born, one of the architects we both like very much, came to the town, where I live since many years, Saarbrücken - Sarrebruck, as the French say:

Georges-Henri Pingusson was deeply involved in the urban planning study La Sarre Urbanisme (1947) and the reconstruction.
The beautiful book begins with a well known quote from Aristotle, translated into French:
„Une ville doit être bâtie de façon à donner à ses habitants la sécurité et le bonheur“.  

It was first published in French and two months later in German. The translation was not such a great success, lacking many details and sometimes missing the point entirely.

But what does it mean here, in the center of the Red Zone, the former territory of Second World War combats between the Westwall and Maginot Line, to give people the feeling of “security and happiness”?

Pingusson, one of the leading architects in France and responsible for the planning, aimed to promote “emancipation culturelle” – or better valorization – of that zone to enhance its bi- and transcultural elements. He saw them as a precious resource and precondition for the further development of Europe as a continent of Peace.

It is still desirable to acknowledge Pingusson as one of those pioneering figures who have invested personally in the Reconstruction for many years, in a place which has changed nationality several times in the 20^th century. His plans for the Saar and the border town of Saarbrücken created a whole new perspective which seems to be more appropriate than ever.
The French Sarrebruck and the German Saarbrücken merged into " Sarrebrück ", the " bridge over the Saar ", " lieu de transit et de rencontres de courants économiques et culturels, politiques et éthniques".

Saarland, the newly created European small state which emerged from the French occupation zone in December 1947, received a newly imagined capital whose name became a mission statement and model.

For Pingusson his work meant “lier des liens d'amitié féconds et durables".

In 1951 the European Community of Coal and Steel was founded – and of course you were born in that very special year.
I am wishing you "bonheur et sécurité" and many more years to build further bridges!

Alles Gute zum Geburtstag : )

Eva