Le Plan-de-la-Tour : Bird dream

Niki de Saint-Phalle is recruited by Rainer von Hessen to develop a land he has just acquired in terms of the tower, in the Var. Between 1968 and 1971, they collaborated each summer to create the dream of the bird, a set of permanent homes integrated into nature. The site, located in a Var forest, is arranged in platforms and fitted out to accommodate inhabited sculptures. The house includes three separate parts, each located on a platform. After the entrance portal, a path leads first to the kitchen-sejour, also called the dream of the bird, which inspired the name of the whole. The kitchen, of cubic shape, is built of prefabricated wood, glass wool and polyester, covered with plaster and with a floor in white tiles, while being dominated by a large bird sculpture and surrounded by polychrome sculptures of various sizes and shapes. On the south side is an outdoor dining room with a table and a bench, painted in shiny metal to strengthen the brightness. A staircase then leads to a second platform. On the left is the bathroom room, nicknamed "Maison Nana or Big Clarice", which has the shape of a female torso, with breasts used as shelters for children. The third platform, called "witch", houses the toilets, whose soil is decorated with a mosaic in glass paste. Two small sculptures, a girl-fontaine and a bed of snakes, complete the whole. From 1976, Rainer von Hessen transformed the garden by adding stairs, terraces and paths, integrated into a relatively raw natural environment.