Paris

Our first museum visit in Paris was at the Centre Pompidou. This museum really fascinated me with the modernisms and uniqueness of the building and art within it. One sculpture that really caught my attention was the Le Monstre de Soisy by artist Niki de Saint Phalle. It was a shape and structure of a rhinoceros but composed of different materials and objects such as spray paint cans, toy animals and objects and guns. On top of these objects it is covered in paint splatters with most of the sculpture kept white or the color of the material that was used. This caught my attention because it was very abstract and used recycled materials to construct it. The way she really thought about where each object will be placed in order to really convey the message she was going for. Each object was carefully thought out on where she wanted to and why it would be going onto the art piece. 

This work of art is a part of group of work from medieval iconography from the legends of Southeast Asia, or creatures of Gaudi. According to Alice Fleury at the Pompidou, “This fabulous universe is populated by rhinoceros, ostriches, boas, spiders, iguanas, monsters’ stranger than each other, which form the substrate of the stories it tells, a real personal mythology where mix delights and horrors.” This sculpture focuses on the violence and death with is a major issue throughout the world. The bright colors and splatter of the paint is what really pulled me into the piece.