Achronie 39, by the artist Marion Verboom

She draws on figurative, geometric, as well as abstract subjects and motifs, which she reproduces, combines, and interprets in her sculptures. She may mix the top of a Merovingian pillar with an Aztec decoration, a contorted face with a composition of plants, or a lock of hair with seashell ridges and a sphinx’s legs.

In dialogue with the façade of Église Sainte-Croix, which is decorated in the purest of classical styles and topped with an allegorical belfry of trumpet-playing angels, Marion Verboom erects Achronie 39. The 8 sculptural fragments made of Jesmonite, cement, bronze, and aluminum, are each inspired in turn by a bestiary, an aquatic pattern, a flute, a Bruegelian character, clockwork, and Gallo-Roman objects from archaeological excavations in Nantes (Dobrée Collection), including the crown of a column, and a mothergoddess nursing two infants. This year, the work finds its permanent home in the garden of the Passage.

This year, the work will find its permanent home in the Passage garden.