The chair: Joseph Skrzynski
Soon after I was appointed chair of the Opera House Trust in 1996, the question was asked: what would we do for the Opera House’s 25th anniversary in 1998? And then, what to do about the building for the next 25 years? There was no central vision. I talked to architects who’d worked with Jørn Utzon on the site. They believed the only ethical and moral course was to close the doors, demolish the interiors and build his original designs. After further conversations, though, including with Jørn’s daughter Lin, we realised we couldn’t go back to the past. There had to be a new way of thinking. The critical factor was to know that Jørn would work with the building as it was now, rather than going back to his old drawings. So we appointed Sydney architect Richard Johnson to develop a masterplan.
We invited Jørn to set out the design principles for future generations of architects and management to use as a guide for any redevelopment, taking the view that the Opera House could well be one of the only Sydney buildings to still be here in 200 years’ time. We asked NSW premier Bob Carr to write formal correspondence from the government. Richard Johnson then went to Mallorca, where Jørn had a home, to see if he could re-engage him. After discussions with Lin, I was confident he would succeed. I went to Copenhagen in 2000 and met Jørn, his wife Lis and son Jan at the Admiral Hotel near the waterfront to formalise the contract with the Trust to bring him back. It was joyous to know we were solving this longstanding problem, to know he would work with us.
“It was one of those wrongs that had to be righted,” says Joseph Skrzynski (pictured in 1996).Credit: Peter Rae
But there were negative voices. I had a call from Davis Hughes [the former NSW public works minister who’d dismissed Utzon] from his retirement home, who was by then 90. He gave me a 45-minute diatribe about what a terrible mistake we were making, how he’d been kind to get rid of Utzon, who’d been clearly out of his depth. It was just appalling.
I met Jørn another time in Denmark. It’s one of the few times in my life I knew I was in the presence of a genius. We were talking about acoustics, pretty technical talks, then somebody asked him his view. He looked up at the ceiling and said, “You know, the hall where the acoustics work best is the hall where the people clap loudest and longest.” It was a great way of telling us not to lose sight of the ambience in among the technical discussions. It was always his holistic approach that was so terrific. Lin said he walked inches taller after we re-engaged with him. He won the Pritzker, the Nobel prize of architecture, five years later. He opened up to the world. For our generation, it was one of those wrongs that had to be righted.
After I left, there was a period when people at the Opera House were keen to get on with practical things and were sometimes antagonistic towards heritage and conservation issues. It’s a tricky balance and a few of us kept hammering away at things we didn’t like, which annoyed the management. I think everyone has come around now, though, to the importance of the conservation management plan.
Bringing Utzon back put the building on a path to becoming as magnificent on the inside as it is on the outside. And I think the Opera Theatre, which needs more seats, a proper orchestra pit, a much bigger stage and the colour Utzon wanted for the interiors, will be rebuilt one day. Just the value of that building: it’s worth billions now, not only as a tourist attraction but as a symbol of Australia as an advanced, mature country. There’s still a long way to go, but it’s a journey.
Joseph Skrzynski was chair of the Sydney Opera House Trust from 1996 to 2004.
The architect’s son: Jan Utzon
Jan Utzon says, “My father wasn’t interested in praise, he was interested in the work.”Credit: Dominic Lorrimer
My father was approached a number of times to come back to the project, but it was the idea of what to do to the Opera House for the next 50 to 100 years that interested him. As my father was older, he agreed to do the job only if I took it on with Richard Johnson and represented him in Sydney. He didn’t want to return himself as he thought it would be a media circus. He knew the inside of the Opera House was very different to the one he’d designed and that he’d have to express his opinion about it.
I knew Sydney well. After I’d finished at Pittwater High School, I studied architecture at the University of New South Wales. I was in my second year when our family had to leave Australia.
When my dad first visited NSW premier Joe Cahill in 1957, he wore a suit. I thought, when an Utzon goes to meet premier Bob Carr for the first time in 1999, I will wear the same suit, too. My father didn’t know I was going to do that but smiled when he found out.
I was lucky to represent him over the next 20 years, visiting the Opera House more than 40 times. At first I was taking videos and photographs of everything to show him. We would sit down and he would say, this is fine, this should be removed, this could wait, these are iconic, these less so. He was energised and happy but realistic about what could be done. As Joe Skrzynski said, if repairs and alterations pop up, they should be done in the Utzon-like way. So he redesigned the reception hall which in 2004 became the Utzon Room, the first interior created to his design. He then came up with ideas for the western foyers which were rebuilt and opened in 2006. We did a proposal for redoing the Joan Sutherland Opera Theatre. We wanted to gut it completely, to lower the floors beneath the stage, enlarge it and have new acoustics. But that is a big economic commitment and I have no idea if it will ever happen.
My father wasn’t interested in praise, he was interested in the work. He won a number of awards and when he won the Pritzker Prize in 2003, he initially declined. I persuaded him that he should accept it and went to Madrid to receive it on his behalf.
My parents lived for many years in Majorca in Spain. But in 2004 my mother got stomach cancer, which was later cured, and my father’s eyesight prevented him from driving, so they decided to return to Denmark. After my father died in 2008, I kept going to Sydney for a while, continuing to work on his vision.
The Sydney Opera House isn’t the work of one person, but the many who’ve collaborated on this complicated and innovative structure. It’s certainly a building that grew up through the care and love of the people of Sydney. It was a fluke my father won the competition, and that Joe Cahill said, “Start straight away”. It was that Australian pioneering spirit: “Let’s do it, mate”.
Jan Utzon is an architect based in Denmark.
The architect: Richard Johnson
When Jørn Utzon was sacked I made my first public protest. I was studying architecture at the University of New South Wales and was so aggrieved. I protested with a bunch of students at Sydney Town Hall, trying to storm a meeting of the Australian Institute of Architects. They wouldn’t support Utzon. I was a member and I immediately resigned and didn’t rejoin for another decade. I also refused to go inside the Opera House for many years.
Richard Johnson recalls thinking of Utzon, “I’ve got him!”Credit: AAP Photo/ Tim Cole
More than 30 years later, in 1998, the Opera House was badly in need of refurbishing and our company, Denton Corker Marshall, submitted an expression of interest to develop a new masterplan. I personally wasn’t keen but I went to the interview with members of the Trust and the NSW Public Works Department hoping I wouldn’t get the job. Controversially, I said, “the architect Jørn Utzon is still alive and there should be no plan without his involvement.” The Trust chair, Joe Skrzynski, listened closely. Later he appointed me as an advisor to ask Jørn to do the work.
Communications were difficult then and once Jørn Utzon replied to my letter to say he’d see me, I flew to Majorca, drove to a hotel and rang him. He said, “You’ll never find me. I’ll come and get you.” Jørn was driving an old car with his wife Lis. I jumped into the back and it was all foggy and I thought, “How have I got myself into this?” I felt a huge responsibility and was nervous about opening up old wounds. He was an appalling driver and, like most architects, he was looking and explaining things rather than looking at the rough, steep road we were driving up in heavy rain.
When I saw a house I thought it was an old farm building. But it was the entry to his fantastic house. They were very welcoming but Lis was ever-present and protective. At the end of the first day it was clear he wasn’t interested. I rang Joe Skrzynski and said I’d blown it and that there was no possible hope.
The next day there were further discussions and Jørn was very interested to know what was happening at the Opera House. On the third day, and in desperation as this was my last shot, I had to tell him that by remaining silent, he’d no longer be an authority on his own building. I said many others were writing about his ideas and no one knew whether they were right or not. That’s when I introduced the idea of the design principles.
I had a rough draft in my satchel and I handed him the document having no idea of his reaction. He read it slowly, looked up and said, “Wouldn’t it have been marvellous if the Acropolis had had such a document!” And I thought, “I’ve got him!” He could see the long-term historic importance.
For the last 25 years we’ve seen the benefit of his re-engagement. People now have an overwhelming love of the building. And I have no doubt the Sydney Opera House will outlive every other structure in our city.
Richard Johnson worked with Jan and Jørn Utzon developing the design principles, collaborating for a decade until Jørn’s death in 2008. He is involved again today, helping the House plan for the next 25 years.
The premier: Bob Carr
When Joe Skrzynski came to my office recommending bringing Jørn Utzon back, I said yes. As someone with a greater interest in art than sport, I felt that the Opera House was an important part of my life but it hadn’t been on my radar to bring him back. I wrote to Utzon on behalf of the government to advise him of his appointment. And I got a lovely handwritten letter back.
When his son Jan Utzon came into my office, we spontaneously erupted into smiles. I said, “I’m the heir to Joe Cahill, my political forebear who employed your father, and here you are, his son.” It was quite touching. He said, “Yes, and I’m wearing my father’s tropical suit!” Of all the memories I had as premier, this was one of the nicest.
“My view was, let’s just produce the reconciliation,” says former premier Bob Carr (pictured in 1996).Credit: Steven Siewert
Even though it was a Labor premier who championed Utzon and a Liberal government which ended his role, I didn’t want to vilify the Liberals over this item in their history. I’m as partisan as the next political leader but I thought that the public works minister, Davis Hughes, might have inherited some real structural budgetary problems. Who am I to adjudicate those complex engineering and fiscal arguments? My view was, let’s just produce the reconciliation. But I like to think that I would never have fired Utzon. I would have established a rapport with him by supporting an outstanding architect and helping him to reconcile the problems.
I agree the Opera House is still a work in progress, with still no money allocated to rebuild the Opera Theatre. The inflationary era we’re in certainly embraces infrastructure but governments have to balance their books and no Canberra government will provide special treatment for a Sydney institution.
The Opera House is an important gathering place and it was a great honour as premier to host events there or be entertained. It was like being the mayor of New York who has the Lincoln Centre.
Bob Carr was premier of NSW from 1995 to 2005.
The CEO: Michael Lynch
My first proper job was with the Australia Council, so when the Opera House opened in 1973, I was able to go to lots of openings. Later, I ran the Sydney Theatre Company and got to know the venues in the building really well. I always thought, “That’s the building I want to run.” In 1998, I was appointed CEO. When I arrived, there were big issues with maintenance. The new Studio theatre was being constructed on the western side and it was being done without any connections to Jørn Utzon. But in the lead-up to the Sydney Olympics, Joe Skrzynski and Richard Johnson were very committed to trying to get Utzon back.
I had an overwhelming feeling that an injustice had left a nasty weeping sore for decades. Yet there was still a tangible sense of residual resentment in the Liberal Party that Utzon was a bad guy and everything had been a Labor f---up.
Michael Lynch in 2002. “It’s upsetting we weren’t able to get Jørn to walk onto the site,” he says now.Credit: Simon Alekna
Utzon eventually agreed to draft the new design principles. Soon after, I remember sitting with his daughter Lin and his architect son Jan at a fantastic concert of the Buena Vista Social Club on the Forecourt. They were connecting their father with Sydney again.
It’s upsetting we weren’t able to get Jørn to walk onto the site. There were numerous failed attempts, including a proposal to send Kerry Packer’s jet to fetch him. I think the building and its relationship to Australia suffered from the fact he never came back.
In 2002, I was offered the job to run South Bank in London and decided to take it. It was bittersweet. In November 2008, I got a call in London from Richard Evans, then Opera House CEO, telling me that Jørn had died and asking me to join him at the funeral in Denmark. In spite of all my dealings with Jørn, I’d never met him. I felt I owed it to him, to the important role he’d played in the development of our country, to be there with his family. It was a beautiful service in the old village church in Helsingør. I saw his coffin and felt a lot of love and strong connection. I was very happy I’d got to at least be in the room with the great man.
Michael Lynch was CEO of the Sydney Opera House from 1998 to 2002.
The journalist: Anne Maria Nicholson
Anne Maria Nicholson with Jørn Utzon in 2002.
My first glimpse of Jørn Utzon was of him striding towards me with his son Jan, both tall, lean and tanned. It was 2002; Jørn was then 84 and coming to vet me at a Mallorca seaside cafe before proceeding with his first television interview in decades. After a 36-hour journey from Sydney to the village of Cala d’Or on the southeast coast of the island, and two years of negotiation to score the interview, I was excited to finally meet the master architect with the legendary reputation of a tragic opera hero.
He was instantly warm and welcoming and sat with me, producer Geoff Hutchison and cameraman Ron Ekkel, who had flown in from the ABC’s Brussels bureau. We passed muster, so the next morning we drove up a rough, winding road to the Utzon summer hideaway, Can Feliz. I was stunned when Jørn opened the door: coincidentally we were dressed identically in yellow shirts and cream suits. The Dane used his wily charm when he said to me, “Close your eyes. I want you to see something beautiful before we start.” He held my hands, led me inside then stopped. “Now you can open your eyes.” I was looking at my reflection in a large hallway mirror. “You see, beautiful!” Suitably disarmed, it was now my job to proceed with my big scoop with the globally lauded architect. No pressure!
His wife, Lis, 83, dressed in white with a girlish headband, and Jan, destined to be his father’s “eyes and ears” in the implementation of the new design guidelines, greeted us inside. Jørn was effusive, showing us the house where he spent half the year when not in Denmark.
Our interview was long and detailed, traversing Utzon’s experience in Australia and troubled life after leaving. “Of course when I left, I thought they would call me back,” he told me, with the cameras rolling. Remarkably, he showed neither bitterness nor regret about what had happened. “It was usual for cathedrals in Europe to take centuries to build and the architects never saw them finished,” he said philosophically.
His passion for the Opera House was obvious as he spoke excitedly of his vision, including plans for a dramatic new red and gold interior to the Opera Theatre, an idea yet to be realised. Jørn joyfully held up colourful abstracts he’d painted. These were to become designs for the huge tapestry that now hangs in the Utzon Room, the first interior to be built to his design. But while the artwork found its niche, the architect never did find a physical place in the building.
“Will you come back?” I asked. His eyes twinkled as he humoured me, suggesting he might return. I knew in my heart that he was never coming back.
Whenever I walk around the Opera House I imagine Jørn’s voice saying, as he did in my interview that day: “I have the Opera House in my head like a composer has his symphony. He can at any time go into the symphony and hear it.”
Anne Maria Nicholson was the first journalist to secure a TV interview with Jørn Utzon in 36 years. The 2002 interview ran on ABC TV’s 7.30 program.
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