Serpent d'océan, Installation artwork in Saint-Brevin-les-Pins, France
Serpent d'océan is a 130-metre aluminium sculpture by Huang Yong Ping, installed on the foreshore at the tip of Nez-de-Chien in Mindin, Saint-Brevin-les-Pins, where the Loire estuary meets the Atlantic. Its segmented spine and rows of curved ribs form arching loops; the tail lies at the low-tide limit and the open mouth at the high-tide limit, so the tide covers and uncovers it.
The work was created in 2012 by Chinese-French artist Huang Yong Ping as part of the Estuaire art exhibition along the Loire estuary. The sculpture remained after the exhibition ended and became a permanent part of the coastal landscape.
The name Serpent d'océan means "Serpent of the Ocean" in French. Huang Yong Ping built the work as a play on how a snake is read in Western and Eastern cultures, and its vertebrae echo the carrelets, the lift nets set along this coast.
The sculpture stands at Mindin point where the Loire flows into the Atlantic and can be reached by a walk along the beach. Tide tables help plan when the skeleton is fully visible or partly underwater.
At high tide, most of the structure disappears below the ocean surface and only the head and upper vertebrae remain visible. Water flows through the bones and makes the serpent look like an actual sea creature emerging.
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