{"id":8644,"date":"2026-05-22T04:03:53","date_gmt":"2026-05-22T04:03:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/siliconvalleymovingpost.com\/?p=8644"},"modified":"2026-05-22T04:03:53","modified_gmt":"2026-05-22T04:03:53","slug":"artist-jr-the-french-banksy-creates-a-cave-installation-over-paris-oldest-bridge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/siliconvalleymovingpost.com\/?p=8644","title":{"rendered":"Artist JR, the \u2018French Banksy\u2019 creates a \u2018cave\u2019 installation over Paris\u2019 oldest bridge"},"content":{"rendered":"

By THOMAS ADAMSON<\/strong><\/p>\n

PARIS (AP) \u2014 The oldest bridge in Paris looked Thursday as if it had been swallowed by a mountain.<\/p>

Read more Man gets 25-to-life for killing OC jail inmate who vomited near him<\/a><\/p>\n

The transformation is the work of JR, the street artist known as the \u201cFrench Banksy,\u201d who this week began inflating a giant artificial \u201ccave\u201d over the Pont Neuf, turning the 17th-century bridge that has carried Parisians across the Seine for more than 400 years into a rocky illusion rising over the river.<\/p>\n

JR has said the idea of La Caverne du Pont Neuf is to bring \u201cmineral and nature\u201d back to the heart of the city. He says he is not covering the bridge so much as revealing the stone taken from limestone quarries from which Paris itself was cut.<\/p>\n

A jagged mass of gray rock now seems to rise over its arches. From downstream, the landmark appears to have vanished beneath a prehistoric cliff, its stone openings transformed into dark cave mouths above the water.<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought, \u2018Where has the bridge gone?\u2019\u201d said Marie Leclerc, 62, who stopped on the quay on her way to work. \u201cIt\u2019s strange because you know it\u2019s fabric and air, but from here it really looks like stone. Paris feels suddenly ancient again.\u201d<\/p>\n

Making Parisians stop \u2013 and be amazed<\/h4>\n

The inflation, carried out overnight after being delayed by bad weather, is the most dramatic stage yet of a project more than a year in the making.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a gigantic puzzle that has just been finished,\u201d JR told The Associated Press at the bridge as his team prepared to pump in the air. \u201cWe\u2019re going to send air inside, and all these rocks will rise into the Paris sky, almost 18 meters high. Once they\u2019re inflated, they stay.\u201d<\/p>

\n<\/div>\n

One of the most ambitious public artworks Paris has seen in decades \u2014 funded by the sale of JR\u2019s work and a handful of corporate partners \u2014 it does not open to the public until June 6.<\/p>\n