Pierre Malphettes: Sculptures terrestres et atmosphériques at Frac Paca

Pierre Malphettes' exhibition 'Sculptures terrestres et atmosphériques' at Frac Provence-Alpes-Côtes d'Azur in Marseille runs from January 23 to April 25, 2009. The show explores the artist's interest in representing both solid and ephemeral elements of landscape—rocks, sand, puddles, fog, wind, and clouds. Works include 'Le nuage de verre', a suspended sculpture of fifteen cut white glass plates forming a luminous, vaporous volume that evokes a sculptural sfumato through overlapping layers. Opposite it, 'Tas de sable' is made from decorative concrete claustras cut with an angle grinder and assembled to recall the original sand pile form. The exhibition features pieces spanning nearly a decade, creating a dialogue that attempts a sensitive representation of natural elements using industrial materials like concrete, glass, steel beams, and polyane tarpaulin. Malphettes' art plays with contradictions—geometric versus indefinite, fragile versus powerful, rational versus chaotic—to craft a surprising plastic language. The experience is described as traversing a construction site as if strolling through benevolent nature.