Placed on the surface of the water of the étang de Clermont, a strangely shaped metal crane spreads its wings. The bird – but is it really a bird? – seems immobile in the middle of the water  but attracts all gazes: with its folds, reflections and  contrasts, the structure gives the feeling of movement, as if it were really trying to fly away. Far from being a wild  imagining, its shape is in fact geographical: the artist Pierre-Alexandre Rémy in fact created this sculpture in reflective galvanised steel sheeting based on a precise topographical survey of the Hortillonnages. The cut-out metal shape is inspired by the complex network of canals, lakes and river which extends over the territory of the communes of Amiens, Rivery and Camon. So with its complexity, it pays homage to the richness of the location, a green oasis with many challenges, and in the same stroke presents its irreducible portrait, an evocation of a region which is both poetic and precise.

Born in 1978, Pierre-Alexandre Rémy is a graduate of the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Appliqués et des Métiers d’Art Olivier de Serres, with a specialism In the “shaping of metal”, to which he added a diploma from the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris. His work questions the relationships between the object and the space in which it exists. So the sculpture produced for the Hortillonnages is part of the “cartenpli” series. He took part in the FIAC Hors les murs exhibition in Paris in 2014.