Father and Son, Public fountain at Olympic Sculpture Park in Seattle, United States.

Father and Son is a 15-foot outdoor fountain and sculpture by Louise Bourgeois, installed in 2005 at Olympic Sculpture Park in Seattle. It is made of stainless steel and aluminum and includes a bronze bell. It depicts a naked man and a naked boy reaching out to each other; at timed intervals, two separate sides of the fountain rise or fall to reveal or obscure one figure or the other.

Father and Son was commissioned by the Seattle Art Museum on behalf of Stu Smailes, a local art philanthropist who died in 2002 and left the city $1 million for a sculpture featuring a nude male. Louise Bourgeois made the work in 2005, collaborating on its design and installation with the local architecture studio ORA.

Father and Son was the first public sculpture in Seattle to show nude figures. The Seattle Art Museum presented it as a work about emotional distance and vulnerability, while some local residents called the figures overtly sexual and pedophilic. The debate itself is part of how the piece is received in the city.

The fountain is accessible throughout the day and evening, with the lighting becoming particularly noticeable as dusk arrives. The park itself is free to enter, and the installation sits directly on a public pathway that is easy to reach.

The bronze bell in the work is not a clock: it refers to Stu Smailes, the Seattle philanthropist who left the city $1 million on his death in 2002 and asked that it fund a sculpture with a nude male figure. Bourgeois was commissioned by the Seattle Art Museum on his behalf and worked with the local studio ORA on the design and installation.