Fountains in Paris
Encyclopedia
The Fountains in Paris originally provided drinking water for city residents, and now are decorative features in the city's squares and parks. Paris has more than three hundred fifty fountains, the oldest dating back to the 16th century.
For the list of Paris fountains by arrondissement, See List of Paris fountains.
In the third century BC, the original inhabitants, the Parisii, took their water directly from the River Seine
. By the first century BC, the Roman engineers of the town of Lutetia
had built the aqueduct of Arcueil
using gravity to provide water for their baths and for their public fountains.
In the Middle Ages
, the Roman aqueduct of Arcueil had fallen into ruins and residents once again took their water from the Seine or from wells. By the reign of Philip II of France
(1180–1223), two large monasteries existed outside the city walls north of Paris; the Abbey of Saint-Laurent, at the foot of Montmartre
, and the Abbey of Saint-Martin-des-Champs. These monasteries received fresh water from two aqueducts; the Abbey of Saint Laurent by lead pipes coming from the heights of Romaineville and Menilmontant, and the Abbey of Saint-Martin-des-Champs by a masonry aqueduct coming from the summit of Belleville. In the first half of the 13th century, these two aqueducts were used to supply water to the first recorded fountains in medieval Paris, the Fontaine des Halles, the Fontaine des Innocents
, and the Fontaine de Maubuée. These fountains did not gush water; water poured out continually in thin streams from bronze masquerons, masks, usually of animals, into stone basins so local residents could fill their vessels with water.
By 1498, when Louis XII of France became King, the water supply of Paris was controlled jointly by the merchants of the city, led by the Prévot des Marchands, and the king. They decided how water would be distributed and were responsible for building public fountains. The water supply of Paris was still very limited; by the end of the 15th century, there were only seventeen fountains providing water in Paris, including five outside the walls. All of the fountains were on the Right Bank; the two aqueducts supplied water, and, as the water table was close to the surface, and it was easy to dig wells there, while on the Left Bank the water table was deep underground and there were no working aqueducts so almost all water had to be carried from the Seine. As a result, the Left Bank had hardly grown since the time of Philip II.
In the early 17th century, King Henry IV of France
decided to bring water to the Left Bank for the University and for the planned Luxembourg Palace
of his wife, Marie de' Medici
. A new aqueduct was built between 1613 and 1623 to bring water from Rungis
. This new aqueduct supplied six new fountains on the Left Bank, including the present-day Medici Fountain
, and one on the Right Bank. In addition, five new fountains were built on the right bank using the two original acqueducts. Henry's brought Tomasso Francini, a Florentine fountain maker, to Paris, where he designed the Medici Fountain
in the Jardin du Luxembourg
. In 1836 he became the Intendant general des Eaux et Fontaines, in charge of all royal fountains and water projects. His descendants held this title until 1781.
Another major contribution of Henry IV was the construction between 1578 and 1608 of La Samaritaine
, an enormous hydraulic water pump, powered by a water wheel under the Pont Neuf, which lifted water up from the Seine to a reservoir near Saint-Germain-l'Auxerois, for use in the Louvre
Palace and the Tuileries Gardens. Two more pumps were added in 1673. Thanks to the pumps and the new aqueduct, by 1673 Paris, with an estimated population of 500,000 people, had 16 fountains on the Right bank fed by aqueducts, 14 fountains on the Left Bank fed by the new Aqueduct of Arcueil, and twenty one new fountains along the Right and Left banks of the river, fed by the new hydraulic pumps.
Of the fountains built in the 16th and 17th century, all were either rebuilt or demolished in the following two centuries. Only a few, such as the Fontaine Boucherat, the Fontaine des Innocents and Medici Fountain, all extensively rebuilt, still preserve the character of their time.
, who, by royal edict, was Contrôleur des bâtiments of the city of Paris between 1692 and 1740. His fountains were usually small, set against a wall, with a niche and a single spout pouring water into a small basin, but they were dignified and elegant, decorated with seashells, mythological figures, and sometimes had imitations of the calcified walls of grottos, imitating natural springs.
In the middle of the 18th century Voltaire
and other critics began to demand more open squares and more ornamental fountains. In Les Embellisements de Paris, written in 1749, Voltaire wrote, "We have only two fountains in good taste, and they should certainly be better placed. All the others are worthy of a village." The government responded to these demands for grander fountains by commissioning the Fontaine des Quatre-Saisons
(1739) and by an even grander project for a square with fountains, Place Louis XV, which became the Place de la Concorde
.
Despite the new fountains, the city had problems supplying enough water to the growing population of the city. In 1776, a private water company, La Comagnie des Eaux de Paris, was started by two mechanical engineers, Jacques-Constantine and Augustin-Charles Périer. They promised to deliver water directly to anyone who could pay for it through a system of pipes directly to homes. They imitated the city of London and installed a steam-powered water pump at Chaillot in 1782. The first pumps, built in Birmingham
, England, and named Constantine and Augustine, raised water from the Seine and filled four reservoirs near the hill of Chaillot, from which the water flowed downhill through iron pipes (also made in England) to their private subscribers, and also to seven new public fountains. In 1786, after the success of the first pumps, two new engines, Louise and Thérèse, were added along the quai d'Orsay
and the Gros Caillou, which, beginning in 1788, pumped water to a 35-metre high tower, which flowed down through pipes to the neighborhoods of les Invalides, Ecole Militaire
, and the faubourg Saint-Germain
.
The creation of the private water company created a bitter political struggle between those who supported the company, including the playwright Pierre Beaumarchais
, the author of the Marriage of Figaro, who was one of the directors and became wealthy from the water company, and those who opposed it, including the guild of water-porters, whose jobs were threatened, led by the Comte de Mirabeau. In 1788, after a financial crisis, the company went bankrupt and passed into the hands of the Royal Treasury, but its technical success was proven; of the eighty-five fountains in Paris in 1807, 45 were fed with water from the company's steam pumps.
The building of monumental fountains was interrupted by the French Revolution
; the Place Louis XV was renamed Place de la Revolution, and the guillotine
was placed near where the fountains were to have been built. The supply of water and the building of fountains became a subject of prime concern for the new First Consul, Napoleon Bonaparte, beginning in 1799.
Napoleon asked his Minister of the Interior, Jean-Antoine Chaptal
, what would be the most useful thing he could do for Paris, and Chaptal replied, "Give it water.". In 1802 Napoleon ordered the construction of the first canal bringing water from a river outside the city, the canal d'Ourcq. The canal was built by Napoleon's energetic Chief Engineer of Bridges and Highways and head of his service of water and sewers, Pierre Simon Girard, who had served with him on his campaign in Egypt
. Girard's grand projects included the Canal Saint-Denis
(finished in 1821), the Canal d'Ourcq (finished in 1822), the Canal Saint-Martin (finished in 1825) which brought enough water for both drinking fountains and decorative fountains.
While his engineers were building canals to bring water to Paris, Napoleon turned his attention to the fountains. In a decree issued May 2, 1806, he announced that it was his wish "to do something grand and useful for Paris." and proposed building fifteen new fountains. He also ordered the cleaning, repair or rebuilding of the many old fountains which had fallen into ruin, such as the Fontaine des Quatre-Saisons
and the Medici Fountain
. His engineers built new fountains in the city's major outdoor markets, and installed several hundred bornes-fontaines, simple stone blocks with a water tap, all over the city. In 1812, he issued a decree that the distribution of water from fountains would be free, and anyone who speculated in drinking water would be severely punished.
Many of the fifteen monumental fountains built by Napoleon were designed by the same architect, François-Jean Bralle
, chief engineer of the water service for the City of Paris, who had worked on the big water pumps at Chaillot, Gros-Caillau and la Samaritaine.
The early Napoleonic fountains, built before the canals were finished, were modest in scale and supplied with a limited amount of water, which poured through the traditional masquerons, or spouts. The later fountains by Napoleon, including the fountain in the Place de Vosges and the Chateau d'eau, were not used primarily for drinking water, and had water shooting into the air and cascading from the vasques into the basins below. These were the first truly decorative fountains in Paris.
. *Fontaine du Palais des Arts (1809–1810). Four lions of cast iron, made by the sculptor Antoine Vaudoyer, were placed on separate pedastals in front of the Palais des Beaux-Arts, spouting water from their mouths into two basins. The fountain stopped working in 1865, and the lions were moved to the square of Boulogne-Billancourt
, where they can be seen today.
in 1830, as France went through the Restoration
of the old monarchy, few new fountains were built, and they were of modest size and artistic ambitions. Between 1813 and 1819 a new market, the marché des Blancs-Manteaux, was constructed by the rue des Hospitaliers. The fountain in the meat market was adorned with bronze spouts in the shape of bull's heads by the sculptor Edme Gaulle
. The market was demolished in 1910 but the heads still remain, now attached to the wall of an ecole maternelle.
Place des Vosges (1830). The original fountain by Pierre Simon Girard in the Place des Vosges (renamed la place Royale during the Restoration) was replaced in 1830 by the current four fountains, designed by Jean-François-Julien Ménager, a student of Vaudoyer, winner of the prix de Rome
, and architect of the City of Paris
. The new fountains are made of volcanic stone from Volvic
in the Auvergne
, and have two circular vasques one above the other, with lions' heads spouting water into the circular basin.
The Fontaine de Gaillon (1828) on the rue d'Antin (2nd arronidissement) was the first major fountain by Louis Visconti, which replaced an earlier fountain by Beausire. Visconti later became famous as the architect of the tomb of Napoleon in the Invalides. The fountain has two vasques, decorated with a young triton
armed with a trident and a horse on a dolphin, and an inscription in Latin: "for the utility and ornament of the city."
In July 1830 the absolute monarchy of Charles X
was overthrown and replaced by the constitutional monarchy of Louis-Philippe. The new government, like earlier ones, faced the problem of a rapidly growing population in Paris, whose need for water was far greater than Napoleon's canal de l'Ourq could supply. Public fountains caused congestion in the narrow streets; carriage and wagon drivers watered their horses in the fountains; water porters fought with local residents for access to the water taps; the fountains in markets were used to wash vegetables and fruits and to clean the streets. A cholera epidemic in 1832 made it evident that Paris needed better water and better sanitation.
The new of the Seine, Rambuteau, ordered the construction of two hundred kilometers of new water pipes and the installation of 1700 borne-fontaines, the simple blocks with water taps introduced by Napoleon. Thanks to these new fountains, which supplied drinking water to the population, the city's architects had the freedom to design new monumental fountains that were purely ornamental in the city's squares.
Fontaines de la Concorde
. (1836–1840) The two fountains in the Place de la Concorde
are the most famous of the fountains built during the time of Louis-Philippe, and came to symbolize the fountains of Paris. They were designed by Jacques-Ignace Hittorff, a student of the neoclassical sculptor Charles Percier
at the École des Beaux-Arts
, who had served as the official Architect of Festivals and Ceremonies for the deposed King, and had spent two years studying the architecture and fountains of Italy.
Hittorff's two fountains are both on maritime themes, because of their proximity to the Ministry of Navy on the Place de la Concorde, and to the Seine. Their arrangement, on a north south axis aligned with the obelisque of Luxor
, and the Rue Royale; and the form of the fountains themselves, were strongly influenced by the fountains of Rome, particularly Piazza Navona
and the square of St. Peters.
Both fountains have the same form: a stone basin; six figures of tritons
or naiades holding fish spouting water; six seated allegorical figures, their feet on the prows of ships, supporting the piedouche, or pedestal, of the circular vasque; four statues of different forms of genius, arts or crafts supporting the upper inverted upper vasque; whose water shoots up and then cascades down to the lower vasque and then the basin.
The north fountain is devoted to the Rivers, with allegorical figures representing the Rhone
and the Rhine, the arts of the harvesting of flowers and fruits, harvesting and grape growing; and the geniuses of river navigation, industry, and agriculture.
The south fountain, closer to the Seine, represents the seas, with figures representing the Atlantic and the Mediterranean; harvesting coral; harvesting fish; collecting shellfish; collecting pearls; and the geniuses of astronomy, navigation and commerce.
Fontaines des Champs-Élysées. (1839–1840). Having finished the fontaines de la Concorde, Hittorff built four additional fountains in the squares on the Champs-Élysées between the Place de la Concorde and the Arc de Triomphe, which had just been finished in 1836. The lower part of each fountain is the same; a circular basin, a pedestal with seashell ornamentation; a vasque supported by dolphins and ornamented with palm leaves; and (on three of the four) lion heads spouting water.
The upper part of each fountain was different;
Carré des Ambassadeurs - a Venus brushing her hair, surrounded by roses and flowing water. (sculptor: Francique-Joseph Duret.)
Carré le Doyen - statue of Diana with roses. (Sculptor: Louis Desprez)
Fontaine de Cirque (north side): Four children, representing the four seasons, with a second vasque decorated with the heads of lions and wild boars. (Sculptor: Jean-Auguste Barre).
Fontaine de l'Elysée (north side). A simple single vasque with cascading water.
The Fontaine Louvois
(1839), by architect Louis Visconti, was built in the new Place Louvois, on the site of the old opera house
. The lower vasque is decorated with signs of the zodiac and masks of the seasons; four female figures representing the rivers Seine
, Loire
, Garonne
and Saône
surround the column supporting the upper vasque. The figures and vasques were made of cast iron, painted to look like bronze.
Fontaine Cuvier (1840–1846). Dedicated to Georges Cuvier
(1769–1832), the naturalist, pioneer of paleontology
and comparative anatomy
. This fountain is located near the Jardin des Plantes
and the museum of natural history, where Cuvier had worked. The statue is placed against a wall, with a low basin, water pouring from the heads of reptiles, and a band of human and animal heads. Above that is an allegorical figure of a seated woman representing Natural History, surrounded by numerous animals, and holding a tablet with Cuvier's motto: "Rerum cognoscere causas." ("to know the causes of things.") Naturalists pointed out that the crocodile
in the group of statues of is turning its head, something that crocodiles are unable to do.
Visconti, who later became famous as the designer of the tomb of Napoleon in the Invalides, designed two other fountains of this new type, commemorating famous Parisians and located in places associated with them.
Fontaine Molière
. (1841–44). This fountain by Visconti, located at the corner of rue Traversière and rue Richelieu, was originally going to be a simple Renaissance fountain with a state of a nymph, but Régnier
, the head of the Comédie Française, proposed that it be instead a monument to the playwright Molière
, since the fountain was near the original site of the Comédie Française and the home of Molière. A public subscription raised money for the fountain. The bronze statue of Molière is by Bernard-Gabriel Seurre, and the two allegorical figures at the base of the fountain, representing Light Comedy and Serious Comedy, are by James Pradier
.
Fontaine Saint-Sulpice, (1843–1848), by Louis Visconti was designed to represent the idea of religious elequence, since it was located on Place Saint-Sulpice
, near the famous theological seminary of St. Sulpice. It honored four famous religious orators of the 17th century; Bossuet
, Fénelon
, Fléchier
, and Massillon
.
Fontaine de l'Archevêche (1843–1845), by Alphonse Vigoureux, located on the present day square Jean XXIII, is a neo-Gothic structure built where the archbishop's palace once stood. The lower part of the fountain shows three archangels defeating the allegorical figure of heresy
, while the spire contains a statue of the Virgin and child.
Several more modest fountains from the time of Louis-Philippe still exist:
Image:Bull head Gaulle Paris.jpg|Bronze bull's head, a spout of the meat market fountain of Paris's marché des Blanc-Manteaux, by sculptor Edme Gaulle
(1819)
File:FontaineCuvier04.jpg|Fontaine Cuvier, Corner of rue Cuvier and rue Linné, 5th arr. (1840-1846), Alphonse Vigouroux, architect and Jean-Jacques Feuchère and René Jules Pomateau, sculptors.
File:Fontaine Molière Paris 1st arrd.jpg|Fontaine Molière, 37 rue de Richelieu (1st arrondissement), (1841-1844), Louis Visconti, architect and Bernard-Gabriel Seurre and James Pradier
, sculptors.
File:PlaceStSulpice 1.JPG|Fontaine de Saint-Sulpice, Place Saint-Sulpice
, (1843-1848), Louis Visconti, architect.
, under Louis Napoleon, which became, by a coup d'état in 1851, the Second Empire
. After an epidemic of cholera
in 1849, one of Louis Napoleon's highest priorities became improving the quality of the water of Paris. At the time Paris had about sixty fountains supplying drinking water for the population, and a dozen fountains which were purely ornamental. Under his new préfet of the Seine, Baron Haussmann
, and his new chief of the waters of Paris, Belgrand, the Paris water system was reconstructed so that water from springs, brought by acqueducts, was used exclusively for drinking water, while less healthy river water was used for washing the streets, watering gardens and parks, and for fountains.
During the Second Empire, as Baron Haussmann launched his reconstruction campaign, famous old fountains were relocated and rebuilt. In 1858 the Fontaine des Innocents
was moved to a new, lower pedestal in the middle of the square, and six basins of flowing water were added on each side., In 1864, to make room for the new boulevard des Medicis, the orangerie behind the Medici Fountain
was demolished, the fountain was moved to a new location in the Jardin du Luxembourg
, statues were added, the fountain of Leda and the Swan, built during the first Empire, was moved to a place behind it, and a long basin built in front of it. The modest original fountain in the Rond-Point of the Champs-Élysées
, built under Louis-Philippe, with just two vasques, was replaced by a larger fountain with six vasques cascading water.
Most of the new monumental fountains built during the reign of Louis Napoleon were the work of a single architect, Gabriel Davioud
. Davioud studied sculpture at the École des Beaux-Arts, then became architect of the service de promenades et plantations of the prefecture of the Seine. He was responsible for the design of many of the squares, gates, benches, pavilions, and other decorative architecture of the Second Empire. His principal basins and fountains were:
Louis Napoleon was captured by the Germans at the disastrous battle of Sedan
in 1870 and lost his title. After the occupation of Paris by the Germans and the brief rule of the Paris Commune
, the Third French Republic was born.
Davioud remained as the chief architect of fountains for the city. His first task was to repair the damage caused to the fountains by the German siege of Paris and the fighting during the suppression of the Paris Commune, which had destroyed the Tuilieries Palace and the Hotel de Ville.
Davioud was able to complete two monumental fountains begun under the Second Empire.
Davioud instructed Carpeaux not to block he view of the Luxembourg Palace or the Paris Observatory, but otherwise he had freedom to design what he wanted. He proposed four figures representing the four corners of the world, holding aloft a celestial sphere, and trying to turn it. The sculptor LeGrain was commissioned to make the sphere, and the sculptor Emmanuel Frémier made the horses in the basin around the statue.
Work on the fountain was stopped because of the war in 1870, but resumed in 1872, and it was dedicated in 1874.
The Prefecture instructed Davioud to replace the old fountain of the Place du Trône with the Dalou's monument in the renamed Place de la Nation
. The statues were cast in bronze, A basin was rebuilt, and the fountain opened in 1899. Later, in 1908, six bronze amphibian animals spouting water sculpted by Georges Gardet
were added to the basin .
The bronze statues of the amphibians were taken by the Germans during World War II and disappeared. The basin was removed in the 1960 to make way for the RER regional railway station, but the statues, without basin or water, are still there.
According to Davioud's plan, two fountains were built. Each has a circular stone basin; a base of gray marble with four seated children in bronze; a bronze vasque; a piédouche, or column, of white marble with medalions with the seal of city, and water spouting from the top; and, at the top of the Piedouche, a river nymph
at the top of the fountain nearest the theater, and a sea nymph at the top of the second fountain. The sea nymph sculpture is by Albert-Ernest Carrier-Belleuse
and the four children at the base by Louis-Adolphe Eude; the river nymph was made by Mathurin Moreau
, and the four children at the base by Charles Gauthier.
The first such exposition, organized in 1855 by Louis Napoleon in response to the huge success of the Universal Exposition in London in 1851, displayed cast-iron fountains, on the model of the Fontaine to Louvois of Visconti, which could be purchased by any town or city.
The most original fountain in the exposition was Les Sources et les Rivieres of France, made by René Lalique
. It was a column of glass five meters high, made up of 128 caryatids of glass, each with a different decoration and size, each spraying a thin stream of water into the fountain below. At night the column was illuminated from within, and could change color. It was placed on a cross of concrete covered with decorated plates of glass, and in an ocagonal basin also decorated with colored and black tiles of glass.
The cascades, fountains and basins of the Trocadero, built for the 1878 exposition, were completely rebuilt for the 1937 exposition. Two monumental statues, Apollon by Henri Bouchard
and Hercule by Albert Pommier, were placed on the esplendade above the fountains. The main feature was a long basin, or water mirror, with twelve fountain creating columns of water 12 meters high; twenty four smaller fountains four meters high; and ten arches of water. At one end, facing the Seine, were twenty powerful water cannon, able to project a jet of water fifty meters. Above the long basin were two smaller basins, linked with the lower basin by casades flanked by 32 sprays of water four meter high, in vasques. These fountains are the only exposition fountains which still exist today, and still function as they did.
The exhibit also featured two more unusual fountains; a fountain in the Spanish pavilion by Alexander Calder
, the Fontaine de Mercure, where a small metal structure created a flow of mercury
, and a fountain of wine
, imitating one once created for Louis XIV at Versailles
.
The removal of the ring of fortifications around Paris created space for many new parks and squares. Most of the new fountains were located in parks and other green spaces, and most were modest in scale.
The biggest fountains of the period were those built for the International Expositions of 1900, 1925 and 1937, and for the Colonial Exposition of 1931. Of those, only the fountains from the 1937 exposition at the Palais de Chaillot still exist. (See section above on Exposition fountains.)
The form of the classic Paris fountain of the 19th century, with a single or double circular vasque, nearly vanished during the 20th century. replaced by a wide variety of styies and new materials. They ranged from neo-classical styles to a glass fountain made by René Lalique
for the Rond-Point des Champs-Élysées (no longer existing). Several fountains were created to showcase statues made for other purposes, such as the statue "France brings peace and prosperity to the colonies", by sculptor Leon Drivier, originally atop the Palace of Colonies of the 1931 Colonial Exposition, which, after the exhibit closed, was moved to be the centerpiece of a new fountain, the Fontaine de Madeline, in place Eduouard Renard.
The subject matter of the new fountains also varied widely: there is a fountain honoring composer Claude Debussy
(The Fontaine Debussy, Place Debussy, 1932); a fountain honoring the engineer who discovered the first artesian well in Paris (The Fontaine George Mulot, on the location of the first artesian well on Rue Grenelle): a fountain for writer Leo Tolstoi; ; a fountain honoring Emile Lavassor, the driver who won first Paris-Bordeaux automobile race in 1895; (Fontaine Lavassor, Porte Maillot; and two fountains in the 16th arrondissement devoted to love; the Fontaine des Amours in the Bagatelle garden (1919) and the Fountain de l'Amour, l'Eveil a la vie. (the awakening of life) in Place de la Porte d'Auteil.
The notable fountains of the pre-war period include, in chronological order:
Only a handful of fountains were built in Paris between 1940 and 1980. The most important ones built during that period were on the edges of the city, on the west, just outside the city limits, at La Defense, and to the east at the Bois de Vincennes.
Between 1981 and 1995, during the terms of President François Mitterrand
and Culture Minister Jack Lang
, and of Mitterrand's bitter political rival, Paris Mayor Jacques Chirac
(Mayor from 1977 until 1995), the city experienced a program of monumental fountain building that exceeded that of Napoleon Bonaparte or Louis Philippe. More than one hundred fountains were built in Paris in the 1980s and 1990s, mostly in the neighborhoods outside the center of Paris, where there had been few fountains before. The Stravinsky Fountain
, the Fountain of the Pyramid of the Louvre
, the Buren Fountain and Les Sphérades fountain in the Palais Royale
, the Fontaine du Parc Andre-Citroen, and new fountains at Les Halles, the Jardin de Reuilly, and beside the Gare Maine-Montparnasse were all built under President Mitterrand and Mayor Chirac.
The Mitterrand-Chirac fountains had no single style or theme. Many of the fountains were designed by famous sculptors or architects, such as Jean Tinguely
, I.M. Pei, Claes Oldenburg
and Daniel Buren
, who had radically different ideas of what a fountain should be. Some of them, like the Pyramide de Louvre fountain, had glistening sheets of water; while in the Buren Fountain in the Palais Royale
, the water was invisible, hidden under the pavement of the fountain. Some of the new fountains were designed with the help of noted landscape architects and used natural materials, such as the fountain in the Parc Floral in the Bois de Vincennes
by landscape architect Daniel Collin and sculptor François Stahly
. Some were solemn, and others were whimsical. Most made little effort to blend with their surroundings - they were designed to attract attention.
President MItterrand and Culture Minister Lang were closely involved in many of the projects they commissioned. Mitterrand personally selected the architect of the Louvre project, and Lang negotiated the design of the Stravinsky Fountain with the sculptors, reducing the number of colorful "nanas" by Niki de Saint-Phalle from two to one.
Many of the fountains were built thanks to a change in the law for public financing of works of art, which required that one percent of the budget for the construction of a public building in Paris be devoted to artistic decoration. This law, originally passed in the 1930s, was extended in the 1980s so that the funding could be used to build art works in the squares and other public areas around the new building. The law was also amended so that the one percent applied to the Grand Projects of the Head of State, which allowed the construction of the fountains near the Pyramid of the Louvre. A special fund, called the Le Fonds de la Commande Publique de l'État, was established to fund new works by living artists. This fund paid for the Daniel Buren fountain in the courtyard of the Palais Royale, and the Bicyclettte ensevelie" by Claes Oldenburg
and Coosje van Bruggen
, and Horloges by the sculptor Arman, located in the Park of the Cite of Sciencds and Industry at La Villette
.
Several new parks were constructed during this period with fountains as their centerpieces. These included the Parc de Belleville
(1988), the historic source of the Paris water supply since the 12th century, where a new park was built, with a flowing stream, cascades, and water stairways, along with two basins with jetting fountains; and Parc André Citroën
(1992), on the banks of the Seine in the 15th arrondissment, on the site of the former automobile factory, where a series of thematic gardens were created by architects Patrick Berger, Jean-Paul Viguier and Jean-François Joddry and landscape architects Alain Provost and GIlles Clément. These different fountains shaped water into columns, mirrors and canals, decorated with modern versions of classical peristyles and nympheums.
The old produce markets of Paris, Les Halles, were the site of another new garden with fountains (1988) by architect Louis Arretche, Jean Willerval Pierre Mougin.
The Jardins de Reuilly (1992) by Pierre Colboc, were built along the Avenue Daumesnil. with water shaped into canals along the pedestrian paths, inspired by gardens in Andalusia
.
A new park, the Jardin Atlantique
, was built in 1994 on the concrete slab that covers the railway lines of the train station Gare Maine-Montparnasse. This included three modern fountains, the Fontaine des Humidités, the Fontaine des Miroitements, and Fontaine des Hespérides, by architects Christine Schnitzler and François Brun, along with landscape architect Michel Pena, which added water and greenery into an urban space surrounded by huge concrete buildings.
Other new fountains were highly original and personal visions of the artists who created them:
The Fontaine de l'Embacle (1984), in Place du Québec, across from the church of Saint-Germain-des-Prés
, by the sculptor Daudelin and architect Alfred Gindre, represents a spring bursting through the pavement, pushing up the paving stones, and then pouring back into the earth.
The fountain called Canyoneaustrate (1988) in front of the Palais Omnisport at Bercy, by the sculptor Singer, shows a giant crevice in the earth, similar to the canyons of the American west, with water cascading down into the canyon to return to its source.
Deux Plateaux in the courtyard of the Palais Royale by minimalist sculptor Daniel Buren, does not look like a fountain at all. A group of columns with black and white vertical stripes are arranged in a courtyard, and water flows beneath them, seen excep through a grill in the pavement, as if at the bottom of a well.
The largest of the new fountains is Le Creuset du temps (1988) by sculptor Shamai Haber
, in the Place de Catalogne behind the Montparnasse train station. It features a gigantic disc, slightly inclined, covered with thousands of granite paving stones in concentric circles, over which water gently flows.
(2008), located on Place Augusta-Holmes, rue Paul Klee, in the 13th arrondissement. It was designed by the French-Chinese sculptor Chen Zhen (1955–2000), shortly before his death in 2000, and finished through the efforts of his spouse and collaborator. It shows a dragon, in stainless steel, glass and plastic, emerging and submerging from the pavement of the square. Water under pressure flows through the transparent skin of the dragon.
For the list of Paris fountains by arrondissement, See List of Paris fountains.
Paris Fountains of the 16th and 17th centuries
The history of fountains in Paris until the mid-19th century was the history of the city's struggle to provide clean drinking water to its growing population. The building of fountains also depended upon the law of gravity; until the introduction of mechanical pumps, the source of the water had to be higher than the fountain for the water to flow.In the third century BC, the original inhabitants, the Parisii, took their water directly from the River Seine
Seine
The Seine is a -long river and an important commercial waterway within the Paris Basin in the north of France. It rises at Saint-Seine near Dijon in northeastern France in the Langres plateau, flowing through Paris and into the English Channel at Le Havre . It is navigable by ocean-going vessels...
. By the first century BC, the Roman engineers of the town of Lutetia
Lutetia
Lutetia was a town in pre-Roman and Roman Gaul. The Gallo-Roman city was a forerunner of the re-established Merovingian town that is the ancestor of present-day Paris...
had built the aqueduct of Arcueil
Arcueil
Arcueil is a commune in the Val-de-Marne department in the southern suburbs of Paris, France. It is located from the center of Paris.-Name:The name Arcueil was recorded for the first time in 1119 as Arcoloï, and later in the 12th century as Arcoïalum, meaning "place of the arches" , in...
using gravity to provide water for their baths and for their public fountains.
In the Middle Ages
Middle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
, the Roman aqueduct of Arcueil had fallen into ruins and residents once again took their water from the Seine or from wells. By the reign of Philip II of France
Philip II of France
Philip II Augustus was the King of France from 1180 until his death. A member of the House of Capet, Philip Augustus was born at Gonesse in the Val-d'Oise, the son of Louis VII and his third wife, Adela of Champagne...
(1180–1223), two large monasteries existed outside the city walls north of Paris; the Abbey of Saint-Laurent, at the foot of Montmartre
Montmartre
Montmartre is a hill which is 130 metres high, giving its name to the surrounding district, in the north of Paris in the 18th arrondissement, a part of the Right Bank. Montmartre is primarily known for the white-domed Basilica of the Sacré Cœur on its summit and as a nightclub district...
, and the Abbey of Saint-Martin-des-Champs. These monasteries received fresh water from two aqueducts; the Abbey of Saint Laurent by lead pipes coming from the heights of Romaineville and Menilmontant, and the Abbey of Saint-Martin-des-Champs by a masonry aqueduct coming from the summit of Belleville. In the first half of the 13th century, these two aqueducts were used to supply water to the first recorded fountains in medieval Paris, the Fontaine des Halles, the Fontaine des Innocents
Fontaine des Innocents
The Fontaine des Innocents is a monumental public fountain located on the place Joachim-du-Bellay in the Les Halles district in the 1st arrondissement of Paris, France. Originally called the Fountain of the Nymphs, it was constructed between 1547 and 1550 by architect Pierre Lescot and sculptor...
, and the Fontaine de Maubuée. These fountains did not gush water; water poured out continually in thin streams from bronze masquerons, masks, usually of animals, into stone basins so local residents could fill their vessels with water.
By 1498, when Louis XII of France became King, the water supply of Paris was controlled jointly by the merchants of the city, led by the Prévot des Marchands, and the king. They decided how water would be distributed and were responsible for building public fountains. The water supply of Paris was still very limited; by the end of the 15th century, there were only seventeen fountains providing water in Paris, including five outside the walls. All of the fountains were on the Right Bank; the two aqueducts supplied water, and, as the water table was close to the surface, and it was easy to dig wells there, while on the Left Bank the water table was deep underground and there were no working aqueducts so almost all water had to be carried from the Seine. As a result, the Left Bank had hardly grown since the time of Philip II.
In the early 17th century, King Henry IV of France
Henry IV of France
Henry IV , Henri-Quatre, was King of France from 1589 to 1610 and King of Navarre from 1572 to 1610. He was the first monarch of the Bourbon branch of the Capetian dynasty in France....
decided to bring water to the Left Bank for the University and for the planned Luxembourg Palace
Luxembourg Palace
The Luxembourg Palace in the 6th arrondissement of Paris, north of the Luxembourg Garden , is the seat of the French Senate.The formal Luxembourg Garden presents a 25-hectare green parterre of gravel and lawn populated with statues and provided with large basins of water where children sail model...
of his wife, Marie de' Medici
Marie de' Medici
Marie de Médicis , Italian Maria de' Medici, was queen consort of France, as the second wife of King Henry IV of France, of the House of Bourbon. She herself was a member of the wealthy and powerful House of Medici...
. A new aqueduct was built between 1613 and 1623 to bring water from Rungis
Rungis
Rungis is a commune in the southern suburbs of Paris, France, in the département of Val-de-Marne.It is best known as the location of the large wholesale food market serving the Paris metropolitan area and beyond, the Marché d'Intérêt National de Rungis, said to be the largest food market in the...
. This new aqueduct supplied six new fountains on the Left Bank, including the present-day Medici Fountain
Medici Fountain
The Medici Fountain is a monumental fountain in the Jardin du Luxembourg in the 6th arrondissement in Paris. It was built in about 1630 by Marie de' Medici, the widow of King Henry IV of France and regent of King Louis XIII of France...
, and one on the Right Bank. In addition, five new fountains were built on the right bank using the two original acqueducts. Henry's brought Tomasso Francini, a Florentine fountain maker, to Paris, where he designed the Medici Fountain
Medici Fountain
The Medici Fountain is a monumental fountain in the Jardin du Luxembourg in the 6th arrondissement in Paris. It was built in about 1630 by Marie de' Medici, the widow of King Henry IV of France and regent of King Louis XIII of France...
in the Jardin du Luxembourg
Jardin du Luxembourg
The Jardin du Luxembourg, or the Luxembourg Gardens, is the second largest public park in Paris The Jardin du Luxembourg, or the Luxembourg Gardens, is the second largest public park in Paris The Jardin du Luxembourg, or the Luxembourg Gardens, is the second largest public park in Paris (224,500 m²...
. In 1836 he became the Intendant general des Eaux et Fontaines, in charge of all royal fountains and water projects. His descendants held this title until 1781.
Another major contribution of Henry IV was the construction between 1578 and 1608 of La Samaritaine
La Samaritaine
La Samaritaine was a large department store in Paris, France, located in the First Arrondissement. The nearest metro station is Pont-Neuf. It is currently owned by LVMH, a luxury-goods maker. The store, which had been operating at a loss since the 1970s, was finally closed in 2005 because the...
, an enormous hydraulic water pump, powered by a water wheel under the Pont Neuf, which lifted water up from the Seine to a reservoir near Saint-Germain-l'Auxerois, for use in the Louvre
Louvre
The Musée du Louvre – in English, the Louvre Museum or simply the Louvre – is one of the world's largest museums, the most visited art museum in the world and a historic monument. A central landmark of Paris, it is located on the Right Bank of the Seine in the 1st arrondissement...
Palace and the Tuileries Gardens. Two more pumps were added in 1673. Thanks to the pumps and the new aqueduct, by 1673 Paris, with an estimated population of 500,000 people, had 16 fountains on the Right bank fed by aqueducts, 14 fountains on the Left Bank fed by the new Aqueduct of Arcueil, and twenty one new fountains along the Right and Left banks of the river, fed by the new hydraulic pumps.
Of the fountains built in the 16th and 17th century, all were either rebuilt or demolished in the following two centuries. Only a few, such as the Fontaine Boucherat, the Fontaine des Innocents and Medici Fountain, all extensively rebuilt, still preserve the character of their time.
Paris Fountains of the 18th century
The eighteenth century saw the construction of thirty new fountains, of which fourteen still survive, and the building of three châteaux d'eau, water reservoirs located inside large structures. Many of these fountains were the work of Jean BeausireJean Beausire
Jean Beausire , was an architect, engineer and fountain-maker and the chief of public works in Paris for King Louis XIV of France and King Louis XV of France between 1684 and 1740, and was the architect of all the public fountains constructed in Paris that period. Several of his fountains still...
, who, by royal edict, was Contrôleur des bâtiments of the city of Paris between 1692 and 1740. His fountains were usually small, set against a wall, with a niche and a single spout pouring water into a small basin, but they were dignified and elegant, decorated with seashells, mythological figures, and sometimes had imitations of the calcified walls of grottos, imitating natural springs.
In the middle of the 18th century Voltaire
Voltaire
François-Marie Arouet , better known by the pen name Voltaire , was a French Enlightenment writer, historian and philosopher famous for his wit and for his advocacy of civil liberties, including freedom of religion, free trade and separation of church and state...
and other critics began to demand more open squares and more ornamental fountains. In Les Embellisements de Paris, written in 1749, Voltaire wrote, "We have only two fountains in good taste, and they should certainly be better placed. All the others are worthy of a village." The government responded to these demands for grander fountains by commissioning the Fontaine des Quatre-Saisons
Fontaine des Quatre-Saisons
The Fontaine des Quatre-Saisons is a monumental 18th-century public fountain, at 57-59 rue de Grenelle in the 7th arrondissement of Paris, France. It was executed by Edme Bouchardon, royal sculptor of King Louis XV , and opened in 1745...
(1739) and by an even grander project for a square with fountains, Place Louis XV, which became the Place de la Concorde
Place de la Concorde
The Place de la Concorde in area, it is the largest square in the French capital. It is located in the city's eighth arrondissement, at the eastern end of the Champs-Élysées.- History :...
.
Despite the new fountains, the city had problems supplying enough water to the growing population of the city. In 1776, a private water company, La Comagnie des Eaux de Paris, was started by two mechanical engineers, Jacques-Constantine and Augustin-Charles Périer. They promised to deliver water directly to anyone who could pay for it through a system of pipes directly to homes. They imitated the city of London and installed a steam-powered water pump at Chaillot in 1782. The first pumps, built in Birmingham
Birmingham
Birmingham is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands of England. It is the most populous British city outside the capital London, with a population of 1,036,900 , and lies at the heart of the West Midlands conurbation, the second most populous urban area in the United Kingdom with a...
, England, and named Constantine and Augustine, raised water from the Seine and filled four reservoirs near the hill of Chaillot, from which the water flowed downhill through iron pipes (also made in England) to their private subscribers, and also to seven new public fountains. In 1786, after the success of the first pumps, two new engines, Louise and Thérèse, were added along the quai d'Orsay
Quai d'Orsay
The Quai d'Orsay is a quai in the VIIe arrondissement of Paris, part of the left bank of the Seine, and the name of the street along it. The Quai becomes the Quai Anatole France east of the Palais Bourbon, and the Quai de Branly west of the Pont de l'Alma.The French Ministry of Foreign Affairs is...
and the Gros Caillou, which, beginning in 1788, pumped water to a 35-metre high tower, which flowed down through pipes to the neighborhoods of les Invalides, Ecole Militaire
École Militaire
The École Militaire is a vast complex of buildings housing various military training facilities located in the 7th arrondissement of Paris, France, southeast of the Champ de Mars....
, and the faubourg Saint-Germain
Saint-Germain-des-Prés
Saint-Germain-des-Prés is an area of the 6th arrondissement of Paris, France, located around the church of the former Abbey of Saint-Germain-des-Prés....
.
The creation of the private water company created a bitter political struggle between those who supported the company, including the playwright Pierre Beaumarchais
Pierre Beaumarchais
Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais was a French playwright, watchmaker, inventor, musician, diplomat, fugitive, spy, publisher, arms dealer, satirist, financier, and revolutionary ....
, the author of the Marriage of Figaro, who was one of the directors and became wealthy from the water company, and those who opposed it, including the guild of water-porters, whose jobs were threatened, led by the Comte de Mirabeau. In 1788, after a financial crisis, the company went bankrupt and passed into the hands of the Royal Treasury, but its technical success was proven; of the eighty-five fountains in Paris in 1807, 45 were fed with water from the company's steam pumps.
Paris Fountains of the Consulate and the First Empire (1799-1815)
French Revolution
The French Revolution , sometimes distinguished as the 'Great French Revolution' , was a period of radical social and political upheaval in France and Europe. The absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries collapsed in three years...
; the Place Louis XV was renamed Place de la Revolution, and the guillotine
Guillotine
The guillotine is a device used for carrying out :executions by decapitation. It consists of a tall upright frame from which an angled blade is suspended. This blade is raised with a rope and then allowed to drop, severing the head from the body...
was placed near where the fountains were to have been built. The supply of water and the building of fountains became a subject of prime concern for the new First Consul, Napoleon Bonaparte, beginning in 1799.
Napoleon asked his Minister of the Interior, Jean-Antoine Chaptal
Jean-Antoine Chaptal
Jean-Antoine Claude, comte Chaptal de Chanteloup was a French chemist and statesman. He established chemical works for the manufacture of the mineral acids, soda and other substances...
, what would be the most useful thing he could do for Paris, and Chaptal replied, "Give it water.". In 1802 Napoleon ordered the construction of the first canal bringing water from a river outside the city, the canal d'Ourcq. The canal was built by Napoleon's energetic Chief Engineer of Bridges and Highways and head of his service of water and sewers, Pierre Simon Girard, who had served with him on his campaign in Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
. Girard's grand projects included the Canal Saint-Denis
Canal Saint-Denis
The Canal Saint-Denis is a canal in Paris that is in length. The canal connects the Canal de l'Ourcq, at a point north-northwest of the Bassin de la Villette in the 19th arrondissement, with the suburban municipalities of Saint-Denis and Aubervilliers in the department of Seine-Saint-Denis...
(finished in 1821), the Canal d'Ourcq (finished in 1822), the Canal Saint-Martin (finished in 1825) which brought enough water for both drinking fountains and decorative fountains.
While his engineers were building canals to bring water to Paris, Napoleon turned his attention to the fountains. In a decree issued May 2, 1806, he announced that it was his wish "to do something grand and useful for Paris." and proposed building fifteen new fountains. He also ordered the cleaning, repair or rebuilding of the many old fountains which had fallen into ruin, such as the Fontaine des Quatre-Saisons
Fontaine des Quatre-Saisons
The Fontaine des Quatre-Saisons is a monumental 18th-century public fountain, at 57-59 rue de Grenelle in the 7th arrondissement of Paris, France. It was executed by Edme Bouchardon, royal sculptor of King Louis XV , and opened in 1745...
and the Medici Fountain
Medici Fountain
The Medici Fountain is a monumental fountain in the Jardin du Luxembourg in the 6th arrondissement in Paris. It was built in about 1630 by Marie de' Medici, the widow of King Henry IV of France and regent of King Louis XIII of France...
. His engineers built new fountains in the city's major outdoor markets, and installed several hundred bornes-fontaines, simple stone blocks with a water tap, all over the city. In 1812, he issued a decree that the distribution of water from fountains would be free, and anyone who speculated in drinking water would be severely punished.
Many of the fifteen monumental fountains built by Napoleon were designed by the same architect, François-Jean Bralle
François-Jean Bralle
François-Jean Bralle was a French architect and engineer, best known as for the construction of fountains in Paris during the time of Napoleon Bonaparte...
, chief engineer of the water service for the City of Paris, who had worked on the big water pumps at Chaillot, Gros-Caillau and la Samaritaine.
The early Napoleonic fountains, built before the canals were finished, were modest in scale and supplied with a limited amount of water, which poured through the traditional masquerons, or spouts. The later fountains by Napoleon, including the fountain in the Place de Vosges and the Chateau d'eau, were not used primarily for drinking water, and had water shooting into the air and cascading from the vasques into the basins below. These were the first truly decorative fountains in Paris.
- Fontaine place des Invalides. This fountain was one of the first completed under Napoleon, built to display the winged lion from the St. Mark's in VeniceVeniceVenice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...
, brought to Paris as a war trophy by Napoleon in 1797. It was a simple stone pedastal with four small spouting bronze heads of lions, with the statue of the winged lion on top. The lion was returned to Venice after Napoleon's defeat in 1815, and the fountain was finally removed in 1840. - Fontaine Desaix. Located in Place Dauphine, this fountain honored the French general Louis Desaix, killed at the battle of Marengo in 1800. It featured a figure of La France Militaire, a woman in a toga and helmet, atop a cylindrical pedestal, with water pouring from spouts around the base. It was taken down when the square was enlarged in 1875 and moved to the city of Riom, Desaix's home, where it still stands.
- Fontaine du PalmierFontaine du PalmierThe Fontaine du Palmier is a monumental fountain located in the Place du Châtelet, between the Théâtre du Châtelet et the Théâtre de la Ville, in the First Arrondissement of Paris....
. (1808) In the Place du ChâteletPlace du ChâteletThe Place du Châtelet is a public square in Paris, on the right bank of the river Seine, on the borderline between the 1st and 4th arrondissements...
, this is the largest surviving fountain from the Empire, built in the form of a Roman triumphal column with the names of Napoleon's victories and bas reliefs on the column, with a statue of Victory on the top. The name comes from the palm-leaf decoration just below the statue. The base of the column is decorated with four figures representing Prudence, Vigilance, Justice and Strength. In 1856, when rue Sebastopol was built, the column was moved and placed on a new pedastal designed by G. Davioud, ornamented with four sphinxes and basins of water. - Fontaine de la Paix (1807) originally in Place St. Sulpice, then in Marché saint Germain, now in the Allee du Seminaire, not far away. A neo-classical monument in a square basin, with allegorical figures representing the sciences, the arts, peace, commerce, agriculture, and other figures. The statue was moved in 1937 to its present location.
- Fontaine du FellahFontaine du FellahThe Fontaine du Fellah, also known as the Egyptian Fountain, located at 52 rue de Sèvres in the 7th arrondissement of Paris, next to the entrance of the Vaneau metro station, was built in 1806 during the rule of Napoleon Bonaparte, in the neo-Egyptian style inspired by Napoleon's Egyptian campaign...
, (1806), built against the wall of hospice des Incurables at 52 rue de Sèvres, was designed by Bralle to resemble an Egyptian temple, with a figure of Antinous, a favorite of the Roman Emperor HadrianHadrianHadrian , was Roman Emperor from 117 to 138. He is best known for building Hadrian's Wall, which marked the northern limit of Roman Britain. In Rome, he re-built the Pantheon and constructed the Temple of Venus and Roma. In addition to being emperor, Hadrian was a humanist and was philhellene in...
, in Egyptian costume, pouring water from two pitchers. It was designed to commemorate Napoleon's Egyptian campaign, and features an Imperial eagle above the statue.
. *Fontaine du Palais des Arts (1809–1810). Four lions of cast iron, made by the sculptor Antoine Vaudoyer, were placed on separate pedastals in front of the Palais des Beaux-Arts, spouting water from their mouths into two basins. The fountain stopped working in 1865, and the lions were moved to the square of Boulogne-Billancourt
Boulogne-Billancourt
Boulogne-Billancourt is a commune in the western suburbs of Paris, France. It is located from the centre of Paris. Boulogne-Billancourt is a sub-prefecture of the Hauts-de-Seine department and the seat of the Arrondissement of Boulogne-Billancourt....
, where they can be seen today.
- Fontaine de Mars. This fountain is still in its original location on the rue Saint-Dominque, near the military hospital. It is ornamented with a bas-relief by sculptor Pierre Beauvallet of MarsMarsMars is the fourth planet from the Sun in the Solar System. The planet is named after the Roman god of war, Mars. It is often described as the "Red Planet", as the iron oxide prevalent on its surface gives it a reddish appearance...
, god of war, and HygieiaHygieiaIn Greek and Roman mythology, Hygieia , was a daughter of the god of medicine, Asclepius. She was the goddess/personification of health , cleanliness and sanitation. She also played an important part in her father's cult...
, goddess of health, cleanliness and sanitation, placed together because the statue was near the military hospital. - Fontaine de LédaFontaine de LédaThe Fontaine de Léda is a sculptural wall fountain built in 1806–1808 during the reign of Napoleon Bonaparte. The fountain depicts the legend of Leda and the Swan, with a central bas-relief panel by Achille Valois...
. This fountain depicting Leda and the SwanLeda and the SwanLeda and the Swan is a motif from Greek mythology in which Zeus came to Leda in the form of a swan. According to later Greek mythology, Leda bore Helen and Polydeuces, children of Zeus, while at the same time bearing Castor and Clytemnestra, children of her husband Tyndareus, the King of Sparta. In...
, with water pouring from the beak of the swan, was made by sculptor Achille Valois. It originally stood at the corner of the rue du Regard and rue de Vaugirard. iT was moved in 1856 to the Jardin du LuxembourgJardin du LuxembourgThe Jardin du Luxembourg, or the Luxembourg Gardens, is the second largest public park in Paris The Jardin du Luxembourg, or the Luxembourg Gardens, is the second largest public park in Paris The Jardin du Luxembourg, or the Luxembourg Gardens, is the second largest public park in Paris (224,500 m²...
, where it is attached to the Medici FountainMedici FountainThe Medici Fountain is a monumental fountain in the Jardin du Luxembourg in the 6th arrondissement in Paris. It was built in about 1630 by Marie de' Medici, the widow of King Henry IV of France and regent of King Louis XIII of France...
. - Chateau d'eau du boulevard Bondi (1812). This fountain, along with the fountains of Ponceau and those in the Place de Vosges, were the first fountains in Paris where the water itself was the chief decorative element, and the sculpture and architecture were secondary. They were all designed by engineer Pierre Simon Girard. The Chateau d'eau was the first monumental fountain in Paris to feature two circular vasques, or stone basins, one above the other on a column, with water overflowing the basins and falling into a larger circular basin below. This design of fountain had existed on a small scale in Roman gardens and in Rome during the Renaissance, and in Aix-en-Provence, but not in Paris, and not on such a large scale. In addition to the central fountain, cast-iron lions spouted water into the lower basin. The novelty and scale of this fountain made it a popular promenade destination of Parisians. The fountain was moved in 1867, and today is located in front of the former Halle from the demolished Paris market of Les HallesLes HallesLes Halles is an area of Paris, France, located in the 1er arrondissement, just south of the fashionable rue Montorgueil. It is named for the large central wholesale marketplace, which was demolished in 1971, to be replaced with an underground modern shopping precinct, the Forum des Halles...
located in la VilletteLa Villette, SeineLa Villette was a French commune in the Seine département lying immediately north-east of Paris, France. It was one of four communes entirely annexed by the city of Paris in 1860. Its territory is now located in the XIXe arrondissement, but a neighborhood has retained its name: the quartier de La...
. - Place des Vosges. (1811). A new fountain designed by Girard was built in the center of the Place des VosgesPlace des VosgesThe Place des Vosges is the oldest planned square in Paris.It is located in the Marais district, and it straddles the dividing-line between the 3rd and 4th arrondissements of Paris.- History :...
. It was one of the first in Paris, along with the chateau d'eau, without water taps to fill pitchers or jugs. It had an octagonal basin, with water spouting upwards and splashing into the basin. The originals by Girard were removed in 1824 and replaced in about 1830 with new fountains by Jean-François Ménager. - Fontaine de l'elephantElephant of the BastilleThe Elephant of the Bastille was a monument in Paris between 1813 and 1846. Originally conceived in 1808 by Napoleon, the statue was intended to be created out of bronze and placed in Place de la Bastille, but only a plaster full-scale model was built...
. The grandest of all Napoleonic fountains was begun in 1811, in the empty space where the Bastille had stood. Work began on the construction of a fountain in the form of a huge bronze elephant, with an observation platform on its back reached by a stairway inside the elephant. The basin for water base was constructed, along with a full-size plaster model of th elephant, but work stopped after the defeat of Napoleon at WaterlooBattle of WaterlooThe Battle of Waterloo was fought on Sunday 18 June 1815 near Waterloo in present-day Belgium, then part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands...
in 1815. The model elephant was not removed until 1848.
Paris Fountains of the Restoration and the Reign of Louis-Philippe (1816–1848)
From the fall of Napoleon in 1815 to the coming to power of Louis PhilippeLouis Philippe
Louis Philippe may refer to:*Louis-Philippe I, King of the French, last King of France*Prince Philippe, Count of Paris, called King Louis Philippe II by some factions*Louis Philippe I, Duke of Orléans*Louis Philippe II, Duke of Orléans...
in 1830, as France went through the Restoration
Bourbon Restoration
The Bourbon Restoration is the name given to the period following the successive events of the French Revolution , the end of the First Republic , and then the forcible end of the First French Empire under Napoleon – when a coalition of European powers restored by arms the monarchy to the...
of the old monarchy, few new fountains were built, and they were of modest size and artistic ambitions. Between 1813 and 1819 a new market, the marché des Blancs-Manteaux, was constructed by the rue des Hospitaliers. The fountain in the meat market was adorned with bronze spouts in the shape of bull's heads by the sculptor Edme Gaulle
Edme Gaulle
Edme Gaulle was a French sculptor.-Life:He began by studying drawing with Francois Devosge at the school in Dijon, then going to follow Jean Guillaume Moitte's course at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris...
. The market was demolished in 1910 but the heads still remain, now attached to the wall of an ecole maternelle.
Place des Vosges (1830). The original fountain by Pierre Simon Girard in the Place des Vosges (renamed la place Royale during the Restoration) was replaced in 1830 by the current four fountains, designed by Jean-François-Julien Ménager, a student of Vaudoyer, winner of the prix de Rome
Prix de Rome
The Prix de Rome was a scholarship for arts students, principally of painting, sculpture, and architecture. It was created, initially for painters and sculptors, in 1663 in France during the reign of Louis XIV. It was an annual bursary for promising artists having proved their talents by...
, and architect of the City of Paris
Architect of the City of Paris
The Architect of the City of Paris is a municipal position, responsible for the design and construction of civic projects in Paris, France....
. The new fountains are made of volcanic stone from Volvic
Volvic
Volvic is a commune in the Puy-de-Dôme department in Auvergne in central France.-History:The church at Volvic is dedicated to “St Priest” . Projectus was killed here in 676 AD.-References:* -External links:***...
in the Auvergne
Auvergne (région)
Auvergne is one of the 27 administrative regions of France. It comprises the 4 departments of Allier, Puy de Dome, Cantal and Haute Loire.The current administrative region of Auvergne is larger than the historical province of Auvergne, and includes provinces and areas that historically were not...
, and have two circular vasques one above the other, with lions' heads spouting water into the circular basin.
The Fontaine de Gaillon (1828) on the rue d'Antin (2nd arronidissement) was the first major fountain by Louis Visconti, which replaced an earlier fountain by Beausire. Visconti later became famous as the architect of the tomb of Napoleon in the Invalides. The fountain has two vasques, decorated with a young triton
Triton (mythology)
Triton is a mythological Greek god, the messenger of the big sea. He is the son of Poseidon, god of the sea, and Amphitrite, goddess of the sea, whose herald he is...
armed with a trident and a horse on a dolphin, and an inscription in Latin: "for the utility and ornament of the city."
In July 1830 the absolute monarchy of Charles X
Charles X of France
Charles X was known for most of his life as the Comte d'Artois before he reigned as King of France and of Navarre from 16 September 1824 until 2 August 1830. A younger brother to Kings Louis XVI and Louis XVIII, he supported the latter in exile and eventually succeeded him...
was overthrown and replaced by the constitutional monarchy of Louis-Philippe. The new government, like earlier ones, faced the problem of a rapidly growing population in Paris, whose need for water was far greater than Napoleon's canal de l'Ourq could supply. Public fountains caused congestion in the narrow streets; carriage and wagon drivers watered their horses in the fountains; water porters fought with local residents for access to the water taps; the fountains in markets were used to wash vegetables and fruits and to clean the streets. A cholera epidemic in 1832 made it evident that Paris needed better water and better sanitation.
The new of the Seine, Rambuteau, ordered the construction of two hundred kilometers of new water pipes and the installation of 1700 borne-fontaines, the simple blocks with water taps introduced by Napoleon. Thanks to these new fountains, which supplied drinking water to the population, the city's architects had the freedom to design new monumental fountains that were purely ornamental in the city's squares.
Fontaines de la Concorde
Fontaines de la Concorde
The Fontaines de la Concorde are two monumental fountains located in the Place de la Concorde in the center of Paris. They were designed by Jacques Ignace Hittorff, and completed in 1840 during the reign of King Louis-Philippe...
. (1836–1840) The two fountains in the Place de la Concorde
Place de la Concorde
The Place de la Concorde in area, it is the largest square in the French capital. It is located in the city's eighth arrondissement, at the eastern end of the Champs-Élysées.- History :...
are the most famous of the fountains built during the time of Louis-Philippe, and came to symbolize the fountains of Paris. They were designed by Jacques-Ignace Hittorff, a student of the neoclassical sculptor Charles Percier
Charles Percier
Charles Percier was a neoclassical French architect, interior decorator and designer, who worked in a close partnership with Pierre François Léonard Fontaine, originally his friend from student days...
at the École des Beaux-Arts
École des Beaux-Arts
École des Beaux-Arts refers to a number of influential art schools in France. The most famous is the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts, now located on the left bank in Paris, across the Seine from the Louvre, in the 6th arrondissement. The school has a history spanning more than 350 years,...
, who had served as the official Architect of Festivals and Ceremonies for the deposed King, and had spent two years studying the architecture and fountains of Italy.
Hittorff's two fountains are both on maritime themes, because of their proximity to the Ministry of Navy on the Place de la Concorde, and to the Seine. Their arrangement, on a north south axis aligned with the obelisque of Luxor
Luxor
Luxor is a city in Upper Egypt and the capital of Luxor Governorate. The population numbers 487,896 , with an area of approximately . As the site of the Ancient Egyptian city of Thebes, Luxor has frequently been characterized as the "world's greatest open air museum", as the ruins of the temple...
, and the Rue Royale; and the form of the fountains themselves, were strongly influenced by the fountains of Rome, particularly Piazza Navona
Piazza Navona
Piazza Navona is a city square in Rome, Italy. It is built on the site of the Stadium of Domitian, built in 1st century AD, and follows the form of the open space of the stadium. The ancient Romans came there to watch the agones , and hence it was known as 'Circus Agonalis'...
and the square of St. Peters.
Both fountains have the same form: a stone basin; six figures of tritons
Triton (mythology)
Triton is a mythological Greek god, the messenger of the big sea. He is the son of Poseidon, god of the sea, and Amphitrite, goddess of the sea, whose herald he is...
or naiades holding fish spouting water; six seated allegorical figures, their feet on the prows of ships, supporting the piedouche, or pedestal, of the circular vasque; four statues of different forms of genius, arts or crafts supporting the upper inverted upper vasque; whose water shoots up and then cascades down to the lower vasque and then the basin.
The north fountain is devoted to the Rivers, with allegorical figures representing the Rhone
Rhône
Rhone can refer to:* Rhone, one of the major rivers of Europe, running through Switzerland and France* Rhône Glacier, the source of the Rhone River and one of the primary contributors to Lake Geneva in the far eastern end of the canton of Valais in Switzerland...
and the Rhine, the arts of the harvesting of flowers and fruits, harvesting and grape growing; and the geniuses of river navigation, industry, and agriculture.
The south fountain, closer to the Seine, represents the seas, with figures representing the Atlantic and the Mediterranean; harvesting coral; harvesting fish; collecting shellfish; collecting pearls; and the geniuses of astronomy, navigation and commerce.
Fontaines des Champs-Élysées. (1839–1840). Having finished the fontaines de la Concorde, Hittorff built four additional fountains in the squares on the Champs-Élysées between the Place de la Concorde and the Arc de Triomphe, which had just been finished in 1836. The lower part of each fountain is the same; a circular basin, a pedestal with seashell ornamentation; a vasque supported by dolphins and ornamented with palm leaves; and (on three of the four) lion heads spouting water.
The upper part of each fountain was different;
Carré des Ambassadeurs - a Venus brushing her hair, surrounded by roses and flowing water. (sculptor: Francique-Joseph Duret.)
Carré le Doyen - statue of Diana with roses. (Sculptor: Louis Desprez)
Fontaine de Cirque (north side): Four children, representing the four seasons, with a second vasque decorated with the heads of lions and wild boars. (Sculptor: Jean-Auguste Barre).
Fontaine de l'Elysée (north side). A simple single vasque with cascading water.
The Fontaine Louvois
Fontaine Louvois
The Fontaine Louvois is a monumental public fountain in Square Louvois on the rue Richelieu in the Second Arrondissement of Paris, near the entrance of the Bibliothèque nationale de France...
(1839), by architect Louis Visconti, was built in the new Place Louvois, on the site of the old opera house
Théâtre National de la rue de la Loi
The Théâtre National de la rue de la Loi was a Parisian theatre located across from the Bibliothèque National de France on the rue de la Loi, which was the name of the rue de Richelieu from 1793 to 1806. The theatre was built by the actress and theatre manageress Mademoiselle Montansier, and opened...
. The lower vasque is decorated with signs of the zodiac and masks of the seasons; four female figures representing the rivers Seine
Seine
The Seine is a -long river and an important commercial waterway within the Paris Basin in the north of France. It rises at Saint-Seine near Dijon in northeastern France in the Langres plateau, flowing through Paris and into the English Channel at Le Havre . It is navigable by ocean-going vessels...
, Loire
Loire
Loire is an administrative department in the east-central part of France occupying the River Loire's upper reaches.-History:Loire was created in 1793 when after just 3½ years the young Rhône-et-Loire department was split into two. This was a response to counter-Revolutionary activities in Lyon...
, Garonne
Garonne
The Garonne is a river in southwest France and northern Spain, with a length of .-Source:The Garonne's headwaters are to be found in the Aran Valley in the Pyrenees, though three different locations have been proposed as the true source: the Uelh deth Garona at Plan de Beret , the Ratera-Saboredo...
and Saône
Saône
The Saône is a river of eastern France. It is a right tributary of the River Rhône. Rising at Vioménil in the Vosges department, it joins the Rhône in Lyon....
surround the column supporting the upper vasque. The figures and vasques were made of cast iron, painted to look like bronze.
Fontaine Cuvier (1840–1846). Dedicated to Georges Cuvier
Georges Cuvier
Georges Chrétien Léopold Dagobert Cuvier or Jean Léopold Nicolas Frédéric Cuvier , known as Georges Cuvier, was a French naturalist and zoologist...
(1769–1832), the naturalist, pioneer of paleontology
Paleontology
Paleontology "old, ancient", ὄν, ὀντ- "being, creature", and λόγος "speech, thought") is the study of prehistoric life. It includes the study of fossils to determine organisms' evolution and interactions with each other and their environments...
and comparative anatomy
Comparative anatomy
Comparative anatomy is the study of similarities and differences in the anatomy of organisms. It is closely related to evolutionary biology and phylogeny .-Description:...
. This fountain is located near the Jardin des Plantes
Jardin des Plantes
The Jardin des Plantes is the main botanical garden in France. It is one of seven departments of the Muséum national d'histoire naturelle. It is situated in the 5ème arrondissement, Paris, on the left bank of the river Seine and covers 28 hectares .- Garden plan :The grounds of the Jardin des...
and the museum of natural history, where Cuvier had worked. The statue is placed against a wall, with a low basin, water pouring from the heads of reptiles, and a band of human and animal heads. Above that is an allegorical figure of a seated woman representing Natural History, surrounded by numerous animals, and holding a tablet with Cuvier's motto: "Rerum cognoscere causas." ("to know the causes of things.") Naturalists pointed out that the crocodile
Crocodile
A crocodile is any species belonging to the family Crocodylidae . The term can also be used more loosely to include all extant members of the order Crocodilia: i.e...
in the group of statues of is turning its head, something that crocodiles are unable to do.
Visconti, who later became famous as the designer of the tomb of Napoleon in the Invalides, designed two other fountains of this new type, commemorating famous Parisians and located in places associated with them.
Fontaine Molière
Fontaine Molière
The Fontaine Molière is a fountain in the 1st arrondissement of Paris, at the junction of rue Molière and rue de Richelieu.Its site was occupied by a fountain known as the fontaine Richelieu until 1838, when it was demolished due to interfering with traffic flow...
. (1841–44). This fountain by Visconti, located at the corner of rue Traversière and rue Richelieu, was originally going to be a simple Renaissance fountain with a state of a nymph, but Régnier
Regnier
Regnier or Régnier may refer to:* Henri de Régnier , French symbolist poet* Mary Pius Regnier , American nun and former general superior of the Sisters of Providence of Saint Mary-of-the-Woods, Indiana...
, the head of the Comédie Française, proposed that it be instead a monument to the playwright Molière
Molière
Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, known by his stage name Molière, was a French playwright and actor who is considered to be one of the greatest masters of comedy in Western literature...
, since the fountain was near the original site of the Comédie Française and the home of Molière. A public subscription raised money for the fountain. The bronze statue of Molière is by Bernard-Gabriel Seurre, and the two allegorical figures at the base of the fountain, representing Light Comedy and Serious Comedy, are by James Pradier
James Pradier
James Pradier, also known as Jean-Jacques Pradier was a Swiss-born French sculptor best known for his work in the neoclassical style.-Life and work:...
.
Fontaine Saint-Sulpice, (1843–1848), by Louis Visconti was designed to represent the idea of religious elequence, since it was located on Place Saint-Sulpice
Place Saint-Sulpice
The large public space at the Place Saint Sulpice, which is dominated on its eastern side by the church of Saint-Sulpice, was built in 1754 as a tranquil garden in the Latin Quarter of the 6th arrondissement of Paris.-Attractions of the square:...
, near the famous theological seminary of St. Sulpice. It honored four famous religious orators of the 17th century; Bossuet
Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet
Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet was a French bishop and theologian, renowned for his sermons and other addresses. He has been considered by many to be one of the most brilliant orators of all time and a masterly French stylist....
, Fénelon
François Fénelon
François de Salignac de la Mothe-Fénelon, more commonly known as François Fénelon , was a French Roman Catholic archbishop, theologian, poet and writer...
, Fléchier
Esprit Fléchier
Esprit Fléchier was a French preacher and author, Bishop of Nîmes from 1687 to 1710.-Life:He was born at Pernes-les-Fontaines, in the département of Vaucluse, in the Comtat Venaissin, and brought up at Tarascon by his uncle, Hercule Audiffret, superior of the Congrégation des Doctrinaires...
, and Massillon
Jean Baptiste Massillon
Jean Baptiste Massillon was a French Catholic bishop and famous preacher, Bishop of Clermont from 1717 until his death.-Early years:Massillon was born at Hyères in Provence where his father was a royal notary...
.
Fontaine de l'Archevêche (1843–1845), by Alphonse Vigoureux, located on the present day square Jean XXIII, is a neo-Gothic structure built where the archbishop's palace once stood. The lower part of the fountain shows three archangels defeating the allegorical figure of heresy
Heresy
Heresy is a controversial or novel change to a system of beliefs, especially a religion, that conflicts with established dogma. It is distinct from apostasy, which is the formal denunciation of one's religion, principles or cause, and blasphemy, which is irreverence toward religion...
, while the spire contains a statue of the Virgin and child.
Several more modest fountains from the time of Louis-Philippe still exist:
- Fontaine Place Jean-Baptiste Clément, (1835), in MontmartreMontmartreMontmartre is a hill which is 130 metres high, giving its name to the surrounding district, in the north of Paris in the 18th arrondissement, a part of the Right Bank. Montmartre is primarily known for the white-domed Basilica of the Sacré Cœur on its summit and as a nightclub district...
, is a wall fountain with a niche decorated with seashell pattern, and a bronze vase with water flowing from a lion's head. - Fontaine Charlemagne, rue Charlemagne, (1835), built against the wall of presbytere of the Church of St. Paul. In the niche, decorated with aquatic plants and animals, is a vasque of cast iron supported by dolphins, with a statue of a child holding a seashell over his head.
- Fontaine Saint-Louis, rue de Tourenne. (1846). Similar to Fontaine Charlemagne, with vasque in the form of a seashell and a figure in zinc representing the Ourq River. The coat of arms of Paris is carved on the upper part of the fountain. The sculptor is Boitel, a pupil of James PradierJames PradierJames Pradier, also known as Jean-Jacques Pradier was a Swiss-born French sculptor best known for his work in the neoclassical style.-Life and work:...
and David d'Angers. - Fontaine de la Roquette, rue de la Roquette, (1846), an arcade with a triangular fronton, decorated with the arms of Paris, dolphins, and fruit, floral patterns and lion heads. Inside the niche are two benches and a mascaron from which water still flows, though the fountain is closed with a gate.
Image:Bull head Gaulle Paris.jpg|Bronze bull's head, a spout of the meat market fountain of Paris's marché des Blanc-Manteaux, by sculptor Edme Gaulle
Edme Gaulle
Edme Gaulle was a French sculptor.-Life:He began by studying drawing with Francois Devosge at the school in Dijon, then going to follow Jean Guillaume Moitte's course at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris...
(1819)
File:FontaineCuvier04.jpg|Fontaine Cuvier, Corner of rue Cuvier and rue Linné, 5th arr. (1840-1846), Alphonse Vigouroux, architect and Jean-Jacques Feuchère and René Jules Pomateau, sculptors.
File:Fontaine Molière Paris 1st arrd.jpg|Fontaine Molière, 37 rue de Richelieu (1st arrondissement), (1841-1844), Louis Visconti, architect and Bernard-Gabriel Seurre and James Pradier
James Pradier
James Pradier, also known as Jean-Jacques Pradier was a Swiss-born French sculptor best known for his work in the neoclassical style.-Life and work:...
, sculptors.
File:PlaceStSulpice 1.JPG|Fontaine de Saint-Sulpice, Place Saint-Sulpice
Place Saint-Sulpice
The large public space at the Place Saint Sulpice, which is dominated on its eastern side by the church of Saint-Sulpice, was built in 1754 as a tranquil garden in the Latin Quarter of the 6th arrondissement of Paris.-Attractions of the square:...
, (1843-1848), Louis Visconti, architect.
Paris Fountains of Louis-Napoleon and the second Empire (1848-1870)
The reign of Louis-Philippe ended abruptly with the Revolution of 1848, and the establishment of the Second RepublicFrench Second Republic
The French Second Republic was the republican government of France between the 1848 Revolution and the coup by Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte which initiated the Second Empire. It officially adopted the motto Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité...
, under Louis Napoleon, which became, by a coup d'état in 1851, the Second Empire
Second French Empire
The Second French Empire or French Empire was the Imperial Bonapartist regime of Napoleon III from 1852 to 1870, between the Second Republic and the Third Republic, in France.-Rule of Napoleon III:...
. After an epidemic of cholera
Cholera
Cholera is an infection of the small intestine that is caused by the bacterium Vibrio cholerae. The main symptoms are profuse watery diarrhea and vomiting. Transmission occurs primarily by drinking or eating water or food that has been contaminated by the diarrhea of an infected person or the feces...
in 1849, one of Louis Napoleon's highest priorities became improving the quality of the water of Paris. At the time Paris had about sixty fountains supplying drinking water for the population, and a dozen fountains which were purely ornamental. Under his new préfet of the Seine, Baron Haussmann
Baron Haussmann
Georges-Eugène Haussmann, commonly known as Baron Haussmann , was a French civic planner whose name is associated with the rebuilding of Paris...
, and his new chief of the waters of Paris, Belgrand, the Paris water system was reconstructed so that water from springs, brought by acqueducts, was used exclusively for drinking water, while less healthy river water was used for washing the streets, watering gardens and parks, and for fountains.
During the Second Empire, as Baron Haussmann launched his reconstruction campaign, famous old fountains were relocated and rebuilt. In 1858 the Fontaine des Innocents
Fontaine des Innocents
The Fontaine des Innocents is a monumental public fountain located on the place Joachim-du-Bellay in the Les Halles district in the 1st arrondissement of Paris, France. Originally called the Fountain of the Nymphs, it was constructed between 1547 and 1550 by architect Pierre Lescot and sculptor...
was moved to a new, lower pedestal in the middle of the square, and six basins of flowing water were added on each side., In 1864, to make room for the new boulevard des Medicis, the orangerie behind the Medici Fountain
Medici Fountain
The Medici Fountain is a monumental fountain in the Jardin du Luxembourg in the 6th arrondissement in Paris. It was built in about 1630 by Marie de' Medici, the widow of King Henry IV of France and regent of King Louis XIII of France...
was demolished, the fountain was moved to a new location in the Jardin du Luxembourg
Jardin du Luxembourg
The Jardin du Luxembourg, or the Luxembourg Gardens, is the second largest public park in Paris The Jardin du Luxembourg, or the Luxembourg Gardens, is the second largest public park in Paris The Jardin du Luxembourg, or the Luxembourg Gardens, is the second largest public park in Paris (224,500 m²...
, statues were added, the fountain of Leda and the Swan, built during the first Empire, was moved to a place behind it, and a long basin built in front of it. The modest original fountain in the Rond-Point of the Champs-Élysées
Champs-Élysées
The Avenue des Champs-Élysées is a prestigious avenue in Paris, France. With its cinemas, cafés, luxury specialty shops and clipped horse-chestnut trees, the Avenue des Champs-Élysées is one of the most famous streets and one of the most expensive strip of real estate in the world. The name is...
, built under Louis-Philippe, with just two vasques, was replaced by a larger fountain with six vasques cascading water.
Most of the new monumental fountains built during the reign of Louis Napoleon were the work of a single architect, Gabriel Davioud
Gabriel Davioud
Jean-Antoine-Gabriel Davioud was a French architect.Davioud was born in Paris and studied at the École des Beaux-Arts under Léon Vaudoyer...
. Davioud studied sculpture at the École des Beaux-Arts, then became architect of the service de promenades et plantations of the prefecture of the Seine. He was responsible for the design of many of the squares, gates, benches, pavilions, and other decorative architecture of the Second Empire. His principal basins and fountains were:
- Fontaines Boulevard Richard-Lenoir. (1862.) When part of the canal St. Martin was covered by the Boulevard Richard Lenoir, Davioud built a long series of fifteen small basins and fountains to aerate the water. Each fountain had a spray of water coming from a bouquet of roses made of cast iron. The fountains were rebuilt in a more modern, less picturesque style in the 20th century.
- Fontaine Place Edmond-Rostand. Davioud built the basin and fountain first, in 1862. In 1884, the statue by Crauk of a tritonTriton (mythology)Triton is a mythological Greek god, the messenger of the big sea. He is the son of Poseidon, god of the sea, and Amphitrite, goddess of the sea, whose herald he is...
and a naiade, holding a large seashell spraying water. was added to the fountain. - Fontaine de la place Pigalle. (1862-63.) The fountain has a circular basin, an octagonal pedestal and a fluted column supporting a single vasque. It was used by residents as a basin place to dump trash, to wash fish, and to do laundry. Today the fountain and place have been renovated.
- Fontaine Square des Arts-et-Metiers (now called Square Emile-Chatemps) (1861). The fountain is composed of an oblong basin with semi-circular ends, in which are placed allegorical statues related to arts and professions, since the fountain was next to the conservatory of arts and metiers. One one side are two statues by Ottin, who also did the statues in the Medici Fountain; a statue of Mercury, holding a scale, an anchor, and a horn of plenty; and Music, wearing a laurel wreath, holding a lyre and a torch. On the other end of the fountain are two statues by GumeryGumeryGumery is a commune in the Aube département in north-central France.-Population:...
; Agriculture, holding sheaves of wheat, and Work, holding a hammer. Between the two groups is a single vasque fountain with a spray of water and water pouring from the heads of lions. - Fontaine place de la Madeleine (1865). (one now located in square Santiago-du-Chili, the other to place François Iier). Davioud built two fountains in front of the Madeleine church, each with a circular marble basin, a pedestal with four griffins, supporting a column with a single vasque decorated with lion heads spouting water. From the vasque rises a column decorated with rings and faces of women. In 1902 both fountains were moved to different parts of Paris to make room for a statue of philosopher and politician Jules Simon.
- Fontaine Saint-MichelFontaine Saint-MichelThe Fontaine Saint-Michel is a monumental fountain located in Place Saint-Michel in the 5th arrondissement in Paris. It was constructed in 1858-1860 during the French Second Empire by the architect Gabriel Davioud.- History :...
(1860) is the best-known fountain of Davioud. Built as part of Baron Haussmann's grand project for the reconstruction of Paris, it was intended be the chief ornament of the enlarged Place Pont-Saint-Michel created by the new boulevard Sebastopol-rive gauche, now Boulevard Saint-MichelBoulevard Saint-MichelThe Boulevard Saint-Michel is one of the two major streets in the Latin Quarter of Paris . It is a tree-lined boulevard which runs south from the pont Saint-Michel on the Seine river and the Place Saint-Michel, crosses the boulevard Saint-Germain and continues alongside the Sorbonne and the...
). Davioud originally wanted a free-standing fountain with a statue of a woman representing peace, but he was required to make a wall fountain hiding the wall of a building at the corner of boulevard Saint-Michel and Saint-André des Arts. His new design featured a structure like a triumphal arch with a statue of Napoleon Bonaparte, but this aroused opposition by the opponents of Louis Napoleon, so it was changed to a statue of the Archangel Michael wrestling with the devil. Nine sculptors worked on the different figures in the composition. It was the last monumental fountain in Paris built against a wall, a style that had been borrowed from Italy and used in the Medici FountainMedici FountainThe Medici Fountain is a monumental fountain in the Jardin du Luxembourg in the 6th arrondissement in Paris. It was built in about 1630 by Marie de' Medici, the widow of King Henry IV of France and regent of King Louis XIII of France...
and the Fontaine des Quatre-SaisonsFontaine des Quatre-SaisonsThe Fontaine des Quatre-Saisons is a monumental 18th-century public fountain, at 57-59 rue de Grenelle in the 7th arrondissement of Paris, France. It was executed by Edme Bouchardon, royal sculptor of King Louis XV , and opened in 1745...
. Later fountains would be free-standing, in the center of squares or parks.
Paris Fountains of the Third Republic (1870-1900)
Battle of Sedan
The Battle of Sedan was fought during the Franco-Prussian War on 1 September 1870. It resulted in the capture of Emperor Napoleon III and large numbers of his troops and for all intents and purposes decided the war in favour of Prussia and its allies, though fighting continued under a new French...
in 1870 and lost his title. After the occupation of Paris by the Germans and the brief rule of the Paris Commune
Paris Commune
The Paris Commune was a government that briefly ruled Paris from March 18 to May 28, 1871. It existed before the split between anarchists and Marxists had taken place, and it is hailed by both groups as the first assumption of power by the working class during the Industrial Revolution...
, the Third French Republic was born.
Davioud remained as the chief architect of fountains for the city. His first task was to repair the damage caused to the fountains by the German siege of Paris and the fighting during the suppression of the Paris Commune, which had destroyed the Tuilieries Palace and the Hotel de Ville.
Davioud was able to complete two monumental fountains begun under the Second Empire.
- The Fontaine de l'ObservatoireFontaine de l'ObservatoireThe Fontaine de l'Observatoire is a monumental fountain located south of the Jardin du Luxembourg in the 6th arrondissement of Paris, with sculpture by Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux. It was dedicated in 1874...
, with sculpture by Jean-Baptiste CarpeauxJean-Baptiste CarpeauxJean-Baptiste Carpeaux was a French sculptor and painter.Born in Valenciennes, Nord, son of a mason, his early studies were under François Rude. Carpeaux entered the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in 1844 and won the Prix de Rome in 1854, and moving to Rome to find inspiration, he there studied the works of...
. This fountain had been proposed in 1866 as part of the creation of the new grand avenue du Luxembourg, a project which called the creation of two new squares, with ornamental lamps and columns, statues, and a fountain. Carpeaux had made the sculptures of La Danse on the facade of the Paris OperaParis OperaThe Paris Opera is the primary opera company of Paris, France. It was founded in 1669 by Louis XIV as the Académie d'Opéra and shortly thereafter was placed under the leadership of Jean-Baptiste Lully and renamed the Académie Royale de Musique...
; these had caused a scandal because of the free expression of the sculpture and the unrestrained emotions on the faces of the statues, much different from the calm expressions of neo-classical statues.
Davioud instructed Carpeaux not to block he view of the Luxembourg Palace or the Paris Observatory, but otherwise he had freedom to design what he wanted. He proposed four figures representing the four corners of the world, holding aloft a celestial sphere, and trying to turn it. The sculptor LeGrain was commissioned to make the sphere, and the sculptor Emmanuel Frémier made the horses in the basin around the statue.
Work on the fountain was stopped because of the war in 1870, but resumed in 1872, and it was dedicated in 1874.
- Fontaine du Triomphe de la République, Place de la Nation, (1899). In 1879, the place Château d'Eau was renamed place de la République, and a competition was held for a monument in the center. The architect François-Charles Morice and his sculptor brother LeopoldLéopold MoriceLéopold Morice was a French sculptor-Life:An apprentice in Bosc's studio then in Jouffroy's studio, he was later admitted to the École nationale des Beaux-Arts aged 19 - his talent gained him several medals during his training there. He won several contracts in 1875 in Paris, Dunkerque, Nîmes,...
won the competition, but a project by another sculptor, Aimé-Jules Dalou, won the most public favor. Dalou had participated in the Paris Commune uprising in 1871 and had been sentenced to forced labor for life, then exiled to London. He designed a twelve-meter high group of allegorical statues: at the base is the Chariot of the Nation was drawn by two lions, led by the Spirit of Liberty and surrounded by figures representing Law, Work, Justice, Peace, and the Spirit of Instruction. A terrestrial globe supports the figure of the Republique, a woman in classical costume, wearing a liberty capLiberty capChiefly it refers to:*liberty cap, a brimless felt cap, such as the Phrygian cap or pileus, emblematic of a slave's manumission in the Ancient World.The phrase may also refer to:*Liberty Cap, a celebrated granite dome in Yosemite National Park...
and holding the fascesFascesFasces are a bundle of wooden sticks with an axe blade emerging from the center, which is an image that traditionally symbolizes summary power and jurisdiction, and/or "strength through unity"...
, the Roman symbol of the law.
The Prefecture instructed Davioud to replace the old fountain of the Place du Trône with the Dalou's monument in the renamed Place de la Nation
Place de la Nation
The place de la Nation is a square in Paris, on the border of the 11th and 12th arrondissements...
. The statues were cast in bronze, A basin was rebuilt, and the fountain opened in 1899. Later, in 1908, six bronze amphibian animals spouting water sculpted by Georges Gardet
Georges Gardet
Georges Gardet was a French sculptor and animalier.The son of a sculptor, Gardet attended the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in the atelier of Aimé Millet and Emmanuel Fremiet...
were added to the basin .
The bronze statues of the amphibians were taken by the Germans during World War II and disappeared. The basin was removed in the 1960 to make way for the RER regional railway station, but the statues, without basin or water, are still there.
- Fontaines place André Malraux (formerly Place du Théatre-Française.) (1874). Davioud built this fountain in the new place, created in 1867, which marked the beginning of the new avenue de l'Opéra, which connected the city's most famous theater with the opera house. The project was begun in 1867, but was interrupted by the war and not finished until 1874.
According to Davioud's plan, two fountains were built. Each has a circular stone basin; a base of gray marble with four seated children in bronze; a bronze vasque; a piédouche, or column, of white marble with medalions with the seal of city, and water spouting from the top; and, at the top of the Piedouche, a river nymph
Nymph
A nymph in Greek mythology is a female minor nature deity typically associated with a particular location or landform. Different from gods, nymphs are generally regarded as divine spirits who animate nature, and are usually depicted as beautiful, young nubile maidens who love to dance and sing;...
at the top of the fountain nearest the theater, and a sea nymph at the top of the second fountain. The sea nymph sculpture is by Albert-Ernest Carrier-Belleuse
Albert-Ernest Carrier-Belleuse
Albert-Ernest Carrier-Belleuse was a French sculptor and painter.- Life :Carrier-Belleuse was a student of David d'Angers and briefly at the École des Beaux-Arts...
and the four children at the base by Louis-Adolphe Eude; the river nymph was made by Mathurin Moreau
Mathurin Moreau
Mathurin Moreau was a French sculptor in the academic style.Moreau was born in Dijon, first exhibited in the 1848 Salon, and finally received a medal of honor from the Salon in 1897...
, and the four children at the base by Charles Gauthier.
- Wallace fountainWallace fountainWallace fountains are public drinking fountains designed by Charles-Auguste Lebourg that appear in the form of small cast-iron sculptures scattered throughout the city of Paris, France, mainly along the most-frequented sidewalks. They are named after the Englishman Richard Wallace, who financed...
. In 1872 a British millionaire, temperance advocate and philanthropist, Sir Richard Wallace, who had spent much of his youth in Paris and had lived there during the 1870 war, recognizing the difficulty and cost of finding drinking water in Paris after the 1870 war, and following a program he had already begun in London, donated fifty cast-iron drinking fountains to the city of Paris. The sculptor of the fountains was Charles-Auguste Lebourg, a student of François RudeFrançois RudeFrançois Rude was a French sculptor. He was the stepfather of Paul Cabet, a sculptor.Born in Dijon, he worked at his father's trade as a stovemaker till the age of sixteen, but received training in drawing from François Devosges, where he learned that a strong, simple contour was an invaluable...
. He designed two models, one free-standing and the other to be attached to a wall, and in 1881, added a third, simpler version. The fountains were a popular success, and new ones were still being installed until the beginning of the First World War.
Paris Exposition Fountains (1855-1937)
Eight universal expositions took place in Paris between 1855 and 1937, and each included fountains, both for decoration and for sale, which demonstrated the latest in technology and artistic styles. They introduced illuminated fountains, fountains which performed with music, fountains made of glass and concrete, and modern abstract fountains to Paris.The first such exposition, organized in 1855 by Louis Napoleon in response to the huge success of the Universal Exposition in London in 1851, displayed cast-iron fountains, on the model of the Fontaine to Louvois of Visconti, which could be purchased by any town or city.
- The Exposition Universelle of 1867 took place in the Champs-de-Mars and across the river at the Trocadero. For the Exposition, Baron Haussmann created a large basin, filled with water pumped by the Seine, to be used for fountains. Artificial rocks and grottos were built in the Champs-de-Mars, with cascading water, ponds and streams. Two monumental fountains were also built, at each end of the Pont d'Iéna, which was the ceremonial entrance of the exhibit. The most spectacular fountain in the exhibit was a crystal fountain, 7.3 meters high, with two vasques 3.1 meters in diameter, made by the firm of BaccaratBaccaratBaccarat is a card game, played at casinos and by gamblers. It is believed to have been introduced into France from Italy during the reign of King Charles VIII , and it is similar to Faro and Basset...
. Only drawings remain of the crystal fountain. - The Exposition Universelle of 1878. For this exposition, the first held during the new Third Republic, a château d'eau with a grotto, upper basin and fountains, a series of cascades, and a lower basin with fountains were built on the slopes of Chaillot, at the foot of the Palais du Trocadero, at the present site of the fountains of the Trocadero. . The basins were surrounded by six gilded cast iron sculptures of animals representing the six continents. (These statues are now located on the parvis of the Musée d'Orsay.).
- The Exposition Universelle of 1889 celebrated the 100th anniversary of the French Revolution. It's most memorable feature was the Eiffel TowerEiffel TowerThe Eiffel Tower is a puddle iron lattice tower located on the Champ de Mars in Paris. Built in 1889, it has become both a global icon of France and one of the most recognizable structures in the world...
, and it took place, like the previous exhibit, on the Champs-de-Mars and the Trocadero. A highlight of the exposition was a fountain illuminated by electric lights shining up though the columns of water, a method first developed in England in 1884. The fountains, located in a basin forty meters in diameter, were given color by plates of colored glass inserted over the lamps. The Fountain of Progress gave its show three times each evening, for twenty minutes, with a series of different colors. The system was primitive; it could only illuminate the water up to a height of four meters - but the effect was new and dramatic and extremely popular. - The Exposition Universelle of 1900 was held both at the Champs-de-Mars and next to the Champs-Élysées, where a Grand and Petit Palais were constructed. One of its most popular features was the Temple of Electricity, near the Champs-Élysées, which had a series of illuminated fountains in front, with lamps shining blue, white and red light. The innovation of 1900 was a keyboard which allowed a rapid series of different colors. But by 1900 electricity was no longer a novelty, and the lighted fountains did not have the same effect that they did in 1889. It was agreed by critics that something new was needed for the 20th century fountain.
- The Exposition Internationale of 1925. This exhibit introduced the first fountains made of modern materials and in the modernist aret styles of the 20th century. The fountain by sculptor Gabriel GuevrekianGabriel GuevrekianGabriel Guevrekian was an architect and landscape designer. Primarily an architect Guevrekian is best known for his contributions to landscape architecture...
was composed of four triangular basins, colored blue or red, and a fountain of glass in the center, surrounded by triangles of grass and flowers. It was the first fountain in Paris composed like a cubist painting.
The most original fountain in the exposition was Les Sources et les Rivieres of France, made by René Lalique
René Lalique
René Jules Lalique was a French glass designer known for his creations of perfume bottles, vases, jewellery, chandeliers, clocks and automobile hood ornaments. He was born in the French village of Ay on 6 April 1860 and died 5 May 1945...
. It was a column of glass five meters high, made up of 128 caryatids of glass, each with a different decoration and size, each spraying a thin stream of water into the fountain below. At night the column was illuminated from within, and could change color. It was placed on a cross of concrete covered with decorated plates of glass, and in an ocagonal basin also decorated with colored and black tiles of glass.
- Colonial Exposition of 1931. This exhibit, designed to showcase France's overseas empire, was held in the eastern part of Paris, at the edge of the Bois de Vincennes, and it expressed two themes; the exoticism of France's distant colonies, and the modernism of France. New technologies shown at the exhibit included neon lights, indirect lighting of building facades (tested on Notre Dame Cathedral, the Place de la Concorde, and the Arc de Triomphe,) and eight monumental modern illuminated fountains.
- The cactus was a metal structure 17 meters high and 16 meters in diameter, with a dozen long branches reaching from the top the ground. Water poured from the top down the branches, and jetted out from the branches to the basin below. The whole structure was illuminated with white light.
- The Théâtre d'eau, or water theater, located on one side of the lake, covering an arc of a circle of about 80 meters, created a performance of dancing water, forming changing bouquets, arches, and curtains of water from its jets and nozzles. It was the ancestor of the modern musical fountainMusical fountainA musical fountain is a type of animated fountain for entertainment purposes that creates an aesthetic design . This is achieved by employing the effects of timed sound waves and timed light against water particles...
. - The pont d'eau was made by jets of water from both sides of Lake Daumesnil, which formed an illuminated water "bridge" forty meters long and six meters wide. This was the first fountain made entirely of water, with no architectural element; the ancestor of the Jet d'eau in Lake Geneva, created twenty years later.
- The Exposition Internationale of 1937, the last exhibit of its kind, was held at the Trocadero and the Champs-de-Mars, and once again the fountains were the highlight. Water jets were placed on both sides of the Seine, with a range of 25 meters, and 174 other fountains placed under the surface of the river. The choreography of the fountains was combined with light, and, for the first time, with music, amplified from eleven rafts with loudspeakers in the river. The music featured compositions by the leading modern composers of the period, including Igor StravinskyIgor StravinskyIgor Fyodorovich Stravinsky ; 6 April 1971) was a Russian, later naturalized French, and then naturalized American composer, pianist, and conductor....
, Darius MilhaudDarius MilhaudDarius Milhaud was a French composer and teacher. He was a member of Les Six—also known as The Group of Six—and one of the most prolific composers of the 20th century. His compositions are influenced by jazz and make use of polytonality...
, and Arthur HoneggerArthur HoneggerArthur Honegger was a Swiss composer, who was born in France and lived a large part of his life in Paris. He was a member of Les six. His most frequently performed work is probably the orchestral work Pacific 231, which is interpreted as imitating the sound of a steam locomotive.-Biography:Born...
.
The cascades, fountains and basins of the Trocadero, built for the 1878 exposition, were completely rebuilt for the 1937 exposition. Two monumental statues, Apollon by Henri Bouchard
Henri Bouchard
Henri Bouchard , was a French sculptor.The son of a carpenter, Bouchard was born in Dijon. He was educated at the Académie Julian and in the studio of Louis-Ernest Barrias before entering the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris. He took the Prix de Rome in 1901...
and Hercule by Albert Pommier, were placed on the esplendade above the fountains. The main feature was a long basin, or water mirror, with twelve fountain creating columns of water 12 meters high; twenty four smaller fountains four meters high; and ten arches of water. At one end, facing the Seine, were twenty powerful water cannon, able to project a jet of water fifty meters. Above the long basin were two smaller basins, linked with the lower basin by casades flanked by 32 sprays of water four meter high, in vasques. These fountains are the only exposition fountains which still exist today, and still function as they did.
The exhibit also featured two more unusual fountains; a fountain in the Spanish pavilion by Alexander Calder
Alexander Calder
Alexander Calder was an American sculptor and artist most famous for inventing mobile sculptures. In addition to mobile and stable sculpture, Alexander Calder also created paintings, lithographs, toys, tapestry, jewelry and household objects.-Childhood:Alexander "Sandy" Calder was born in Lawnton,...
, the Fontaine de Mercure, where a small metal structure created a flow of mercury
Mercury (element)
Mercury is a chemical element with the symbol Hg and atomic number 80. It is also known as quicksilver or hydrargyrum...
, and a fountain of wine
Wine
Wine is an alcoholic beverage, made of fermented fruit juice, usually from grapes. The natural chemical balance of grapes lets them ferment without the addition of sugars, acids, enzymes, or other nutrients. Grape wine is produced by fermenting crushed grapes using various types of yeast. Yeast...
, imitating one once created for Louis XIV at Versailles
Versailles
Versailles , a city renowned for its château, the Palace of Versailles, was the de facto capital of the kingdom of France for over a century, from 1682 to 1789. It is now a wealthy suburb of Paris and remains an important administrative and judicial centre...
.
Paris Fountains (1900-1945)
Paris fountains in the 20th century no longer had to supply drinking water - they were purely decorative; and, since their water usually came from the river and not from the city adqueducts, their water was no longer drinkable. Twenty-eight new fountains were built in Paris between 1900 and 1940; nine new fountains between 1900 and 1910; four between 1920 and 1930; and fifteen between 1930 and 1940.The removal of the ring of fortifications around Paris created space for many new parks and squares. Most of the new fountains were located in parks and other green spaces, and most were modest in scale.
The biggest fountains of the period were those built for the International Expositions of 1900, 1925 and 1937, and for the Colonial Exposition of 1931. Of those, only the fountains from the 1937 exposition at the Palais de Chaillot still exist. (See section above on Exposition fountains.)
The form of the classic Paris fountain of the 19th century, with a single or double circular vasque, nearly vanished during the 20th century. replaced by a wide variety of styies and new materials. They ranged from neo-classical styles to a glass fountain made by René Lalique
René Lalique
René Jules Lalique was a French glass designer known for his creations of perfume bottles, vases, jewellery, chandeliers, clocks and automobile hood ornaments. He was born in the French village of Ay on 6 April 1860 and died 5 May 1945...
for the Rond-Point des Champs-Élysées (no longer existing). Several fountains were created to showcase statues made for other purposes, such as the statue "France brings peace and prosperity to the colonies", by sculptor Leon Drivier, originally atop the Palace of Colonies of the 1931 Colonial Exposition, which, after the exhibit closed, was moved to be the centerpiece of a new fountain, the Fontaine de Madeline, in place Eduouard Renard.
The subject matter of the new fountains also varied widely: there is a fountain honoring composer Claude Debussy
Claude Debussy
Claude-Achille Debussy was a French composer. Along with Maurice Ravel, he was one of the most prominent figures working within the field of impressionist music, though he himself intensely disliked the term when applied to his compositions...
(The Fontaine Debussy, Place Debussy, 1932); a fountain honoring the engineer who discovered the first artesian well in Paris (The Fontaine George Mulot, on the location of the first artesian well on Rue Grenelle): a fountain for writer Leo Tolstoi; ; a fountain honoring Emile Lavassor, the driver who won first Paris-Bordeaux automobile race in 1895; (Fontaine Lavassor, Porte Maillot; and two fountains in the 16th arrondissement devoted to love; the Fontaine des Amours in the Bagatelle garden (1919) and the Fountain de l'Amour, l'Eveil a la vie. (the awakening of life) in Place de la Porte d'Auteil.
The notable fountains of the pre-war period include, in chronological order:
- Fontaine Levassor, Porte Maillot, 16th arr. ((1907). Jules Daulou and Lefevre, sculptors. The fountain honors the winner of the 1895 Paris to Bordeaux automobile race, and is the only fountain in Paris with a bas-relief of an automobile.
- Fontaine des Amours de Bagatelle, Parc-de-Batagelle, 16th arr., (1919). Raymond Sudre, architect.
- The Chateau d'eau in Place Jean-Baptiste-Clemente at the foot of the butte of MontmartreMontmartreMontmartre is a hill which is 130 metres high, giving its name to the surrounding district, in the north of Paris in the 18th arrondissement, a part of the Right Bank. Montmartre is primarily known for the white-domed Basilica of the Sacré Cœur on its summit and as a nightclub district...
, 18th arr. (1932.) Paul Gasq, sculptor. - The Fontaine Debussy, in Square Debussy. 16th arr. (1932), by sculptors Jan and Joel Martel, and Jean Burkhalter, architect.
- Fontaine Tolstoi, Square Leon Tolstoi, 16th arr. (1934). Cassou, sculptor.
- Fontaine de la Porte Dorée, Place Edouard-Renard, 12th arr. (1935.) Sculpture by Leon Drivier, Louis Madeline, architect. The fountain was built to showcase the statue, France the Colonizer, which had stood at the entrance of the Paris Colonial Exposition of 1931.
- Fontaine Steinlen, Square Constantin-Pecquier, 18th arr. (1936). Paul Vannier, sculptor.
- The Fontaines de la Porte de Saint-Cloud, Place Port de Saint-Cloud, 16th arr. (1936). Paul Landowski, sculptor, and Robert Pommier and Jacques Billard, architects. The monumental fountains were made to fill a vast square created in 1926 for a tramway and railway station and meeting point of seven avenues, where the old gates and fortifications of the city had been. The central features were two cylindrical columns, fifteen meters high, spouting water and covered with bas-reliefs, and illuminated at night, designed to serve as a symbolic entrance to the city. Their creator, the sculptor Paul Landowski, wrote, "these are the first fountains in Paris in which the effects of light, architecture and sculpture were joined from the very beginning."
- Fontaines de Trocadéro and Fontaines de Varsovie on the Esplenade and in the gardens of the Palais de Trocadéro, (1937), built for the 1937 International Exposition. (see Exposition Fountains above.) The pumping room under the fountain basin was renovated between 2010 and 2011, and the fountain fully functions as it previously did.
- L'Accueil de Paris, Femme au Bain in Square de la Butte-du-Chapeau-Rouge, 19th arr. (1938.) The architect was Léon Azema, city architect, who created a series of new squares and parks where the old city fortifications had been. The sculpture, by Raymond Couvegnes, had been featured at the 1937 International Exposition.
Paris fountains (1945-2000)
Between 1981 and 1995, during the terms of President François Mitterrand
François Mitterrand
François Maurice Adrien Marie Mitterrand was the 21st President of the French Republic and ex officio Co-Prince of Andorra, serving from 1981 until 1995. He is the longest-serving President of France and, as leader of the Socialist Party, the only figure from the left so far elected President...
and Culture Minister Jack Lang
Jack Lang (French politician)
Jack Mathieu Émile Lang is a French politician. A member of the Socialist Party, he served as France's Minister of Culture from 1981 to 1986 and 1988 to 1992, and as Minister of Education from 1992 to 1993 and 2000 to 2002. He was also the Mayor of Blois from 1989 to 2000...
, and of Mitterrand's bitter political rival, Paris Mayor Jacques Chirac
Jacques Chirac
Jacques René Chirac is a French politician who served as President of France from 1995 to 2007. He previously served as Prime Minister of France from 1974 to 1976 and from 1986 to 1988 , and as Mayor of Paris from 1977 to 1995.After completing his studies of the DEA's degree at the...
(Mayor from 1977 until 1995), the city experienced a program of monumental fountain building that exceeded that of Napoleon Bonaparte or Louis Philippe. More than one hundred fountains were built in Paris in the 1980s and 1990s, mostly in the neighborhoods outside the center of Paris, where there had been few fountains before. The Stravinsky Fountain
Stravinsky Fountain
The Stravinsky Fountain is a whimsical public fountain ornamented with sixteen works of sculpture, moving and spraying water, representing the works of composer Igor Stravinsky...
, the Fountain of the Pyramid of the Louvre
Louvre
The Musée du Louvre – in English, the Louvre Museum or simply the Louvre – is one of the world's largest museums, the most visited art museum in the world and a historic monument. A central landmark of Paris, it is located on the Right Bank of the Seine in the 1st arrondissement...
, the Buren Fountain and Les Sphérades fountain in the Palais Royale
Palais Royale
Palais Royale is a dance hall in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located on Lake Shore Boulevard at the foot of Roncesvalles Avenue on Lake Ontario. Originally built as a boat works, it became notable as a night club in the now-defunct Sunnyside Amusement Park, hosting many prominent 'big band' jazz bands...
, the Fontaine du Parc Andre-Citroen, and new fountains at Les Halles, the Jardin de Reuilly, and beside the Gare Maine-Montparnasse were all built under President Mitterrand and Mayor Chirac.
The Mitterrand-Chirac fountains had no single style or theme. Many of the fountains were designed by famous sculptors or architects, such as Jean Tinguely
Jean Tinguely
Jean Tinguely was a Swiss painter and sculptor. He is best known for his sculptural machines or kinetic art, in the Dada tradition; known officially as metamechanics...
, I.M. Pei, Claes Oldenburg
Claes Oldenburg
Claes Oldenburg is a Swedish sculptor, best known for his public art installations typically featuring very large replicas of everyday objects...
and Daniel Buren
Daniel Buren
Daniel Buren is a French conceptual artist.- Work :Sometimes classified as an abstract minimalist Buren is known best for using regular, contrasting maxi stripes to integrate the visual surface and architectural space, notably historical, landmark architecture.Among his chief concerns is the...
, who had radically different ideas of what a fountain should be. Some of them, like the Pyramide de Louvre fountain, had glistening sheets of water; while in the Buren Fountain in the Palais Royale
Palais Royale
Palais Royale is a dance hall in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located on Lake Shore Boulevard at the foot of Roncesvalles Avenue on Lake Ontario. Originally built as a boat works, it became notable as a night club in the now-defunct Sunnyside Amusement Park, hosting many prominent 'big band' jazz bands...
, the water was invisible, hidden under the pavement of the fountain. Some of the new fountains were designed with the help of noted landscape architects and used natural materials, such as the fountain in the Parc Floral in the Bois de Vincennes
Bois de Vincennes
The Bois de Vincennes is a park in the English landscape manner to the east of Paris. The park is named after the nearby town of Vincennes....
by landscape architect Daniel Collin and sculptor François Stahly
François Stahly
François Stahly was a German-French sculptor....
. Some were solemn, and others were whimsical. Most made little effort to blend with their surroundings - they were designed to attract attention.
President MItterrand and Culture Minister Lang were closely involved in many of the projects they commissioned. Mitterrand personally selected the architect of the Louvre project, and Lang negotiated the design of the Stravinsky Fountain with the sculptors, reducing the number of colorful "nanas" by Niki de Saint-Phalle from two to one.
Many of the fountains were built thanks to a change in the law for public financing of works of art, which required that one percent of the budget for the construction of a public building in Paris be devoted to artistic decoration. This law, originally passed in the 1930s, was extended in the 1980s so that the funding could be used to build art works in the squares and other public areas around the new building. The law was also amended so that the one percent applied to the Grand Projects of the Head of State, which allowed the construction of the fountains near the Pyramid of the Louvre. A special fund, called the Le Fonds de la Commande Publique de l'État, was established to fund new works by living artists. This fund paid for the Daniel Buren fountain in the courtyard of the Palais Royale, and the Bicyclettte ensevelie" by Claes Oldenburg
Claes Oldenburg
Claes Oldenburg is a Swedish sculptor, best known for his public art installations typically featuring very large replicas of everyday objects...
and Coosje van Bruggen
Coosje van Bruggen
Coosje van Bruggen was a sculptor, art historian, and critic. She collaborated extensively with her husband, Claes Oldenburg.-Biography:...
, and Horloges by the sculptor Arman, located in the Park of the Cite of Sciencds and Industry at La Villette
La Villette, Seine
La Villette was a French commune in the Seine département lying immediately north-east of Paris, France. It was one of four communes entirely annexed by the city of Paris in 1860. Its territory is now located in the XIXe arrondissement, but a neighborhood has retained its name: the quartier de La...
.
Several new parks were constructed during this period with fountains as their centerpieces. These included the Parc de Belleville
Parc de Belleville
The Parc de Belleville, one of the parks and gardens of the 20th arrondissement of Paris, is situated between the Parc des Buttes-Chaumont and the Père Lachaise Cemetery.-Description:...
(1988), the historic source of the Paris water supply since the 12th century, where a new park was built, with a flowing stream, cascades, and water stairways, along with two basins with jetting fountains; and Parc André Citroën
Parc André Citroën
Parc André Citroën is a public park located on the left bank of the river Seine in the XVe arrondissement of Paris. The park was built on the site of a former Citroën automobile manufacturing plant, and is named after company founder André Citroën.-History:In 1915, Citroën built his factory on...
(1992), on the banks of the Seine in the 15th arrondissment, on the site of the former automobile factory, where a series of thematic gardens were created by architects Patrick Berger, Jean-Paul Viguier and Jean-François Joddry and landscape architects Alain Provost and GIlles Clément. These different fountains shaped water into columns, mirrors and canals, decorated with modern versions of classical peristyles and nympheums.
The old produce markets of Paris, Les Halles, were the site of another new garden with fountains (1988) by architect Louis Arretche, Jean Willerval Pierre Mougin.
The Jardins de Reuilly (1992) by Pierre Colboc, were built along the Avenue Daumesnil. with water shaped into canals along the pedestrian paths, inspired by gardens in Andalusia
Andalusia
Andalusia is the most populous and the second largest in area of the autonomous communities of Spain. The Andalusian autonomous community is officially recognised as a nationality of Spain. The territory is divided into eight provinces: Huelva, Seville, Cádiz, Córdoba, Málaga, Jaén, Granada and...
.
A new park, the Jardin Atlantique
Jardin Atlantique
The Jardin Atlantique is a public park and garden located in the 15th arrondissement of Paris, on the roof that covers the tracks and platforms of the Gare Montparnasse railway station. It has an area of 3.4 hectares...
, was built in 1994 on the concrete slab that covers the railway lines of the train station Gare Maine-Montparnasse. This included three modern fountains, the Fontaine des Humidités, the Fontaine des Miroitements, and Fontaine des Hespérides, by architects Christine Schnitzler and François Brun, along with landscape architect Michel Pena, which added water and greenery into an urban space surrounded by huge concrete buildings.
Other new fountains were highly original and personal visions of the artists who created them:
The Fontaine de l'Embacle (1984), in Place du Québec, across from the church of Saint-Germain-des-Prés
Saint-Germain-des-Prés
Saint-Germain-des-Prés is an area of the 6th arrondissement of Paris, France, located around the church of the former Abbey of Saint-Germain-des-Prés....
, by the sculptor Daudelin and architect Alfred Gindre, represents a spring bursting through the pavement, pushing up the paving stones, and then pouring back into the earth.
The fountain called Canyoneaustrate (1988) in front of the Palais Omnisport at Bercy, by the sculptor Singer, shows a giant crevice in the earth, similar to the canyons of the American west, with water cascading down into the canyon to return to its source.
Deux Plateaux in the courtyard of the Palais Royale by minimalist sculptor Daniel Buren, does not look like a fountain at all. A group of columns with black and white vertical stripes are arranged in a courtyard, and water flows beneath them, seen excep through a grill in the pavement, as if at the bottom of a well.
The largest of the new fountains is Le Creuset du temps (1988) by sculptor Shamai Haber
Shamai Haber
Shamai Haber was a sculptor who lived and worked in Paris, France. He died in 1995.- Biography :Haber was born ing Lodz, Poland in 1922 but emigrated in 1935. He first went to Luxembourg and then to Israel. While in Tel Aviv he attended the Academy of Fine Arts. He studied with Moshe Sternschuss...
, in the Place de Catalogne behind the Montparnasse train station. It features a gigantic disc, slightly inclined, covered with thousands of granite paving stones in concentric circles, over which water gently flows.
Paris fountains since 2000
Few new fountains have been built in Paris since 2000. The most notable is La Danse de la fontaine emergenteLa Danse de la fontaine emergente
Danse de la fontaine émergente is the most recent monumental fountain constructed in Paris. It is located on Place Augusta-Holmes, rue Paul Klee, in the 13th arrondissement...
(2008), located on Place Augusta-Holmes, rue Paul Klee, in the 13th arrondissement. It was designed by the French-Chinese sculptor Chen Zhen (1955–2000), shortly before his death in 2000, and finished through the efforts of his spouse and collaborator. It shows a dragon, in stainless steel, glass and plastic, emerging and submerging from the pavement of the square. Water under pressure flows through the transparent skin of the dragon.