Fujiko Nakaya – Fog Tree #07031, Honfleur

Fujiko Nakaya (born in 1933) is undoubtedly the doyenne of environmental art. After studying painting, notably in Paris, the artist devoted herself to experiments combining art and technology, and created her first fog installation in Osaka in 1970. Her installations have since toured the world.

Fujiko Nakaya's mists are works in perpetual transformation, without limits of space and time. By creating with water as her sole material, the artist accepts that her work escapes her control: it thus belongs to the public who pass through it and experience it, in a rare artistic and natural experience that resonates with Claude Monet.

From his earliest years, under the tutelage of Eugène Boudin, the master of Honfleur's clouds, Claude Monet sought to reproduce the fleeting impressions left by the natural elements. Fujiko Nakaya, born seven years after Monet's death, does not reproduce; she creates her sensations in and with nature.

Fujiko Nakaya installs her Norman fog in the Garden of Personalities, which runs along the banks of the Seine River and the constant passage of container ships. Conceived during a residency at the Ferme Saint Siméon (150 years after Monet himself stayed there), this historical work by Fujiko Nakaya is an invitation to slow down and engage in immersive contemplation.

With the support of the Caisse des Dépôts' patronage, the support of the Toshino Gypsum Foundation and ETRIA