In 1976, Albert Meister wrote a fictional text called La soi-disant utopie du centre Beaubourg under the pseudonym Gustave Affeulpin. This text coincided with the Centre Beaubourg opening in Paris, the new centre of French culture. Meister's text imagines a world where seventy-six storeys below, a radical libertarian space exists for alternative modes of work and creation. The narrator tells the story of this free organisation in a satirical way, using both humorous and poetic language, always focusing on the main target: state-sponsored culture.

This is the first time La soi-disant utopie du centre Beaubourg has been translated and published in English. I have undertaken this project to revitalise a significant cultural treatise that includes many elements of Meister's sociological thinking. I also reflect on my subjective role as an artist in transferring ideas from one cultural framework and era to another.