Outsider Environments Europe: Gilles Rantière, Village miniature / Miniature village

February 04, 2018

Gilles Rantière, Village miniature / Miniature village

a town hall

pictures courtesy of Annie Fortin

This miniature village is located outside of St Michel-Mont-Mercure, a community of some 1700 inhabitants in the Vendée area in France. Its name refers to a 288 m high hill on the spot, the highest of the region.

Life and work

The mini village, a project begun 2006 and still under construction, is a creation of Gilles Rantière, born in 1948 and a mason probably during all of his life.

a school

The mini village, still modest in size, currently includes a town hall, a school. a church, a mill, a wash-house (a lavoir in French), a barn and a little bridge. To construct these small structures Rantière would mainly use granite stones from nearby Haute Bocage, a hilly area with deep valleys interspersed with rocky ground and granite hills.

the church with the priest in front

The small constructions are finished in detail. For example, the inside of the church pictured above is equipped with benches and a priest at the altar. The school (second picture from above) has tables and a teachers desk.

And in the town hall (first picture from above) the mayor is present, as well as a bride and a groom, both dressed festively for their wedding day.

Rantière would place these characters before installing the roofs of the buildings.

the stable

Those who are familiar with the field of French art environments might think that the characters in the above photos in some way feel familiar.

And right they are. These small scale sculptures have been created by Vivi Fortin, who already has an entry in this weblog.

a miller in front of a flour mill

Above picture shows this clearly. The miller carrying a bag of flour (= former French president Nicolas Sarkozy) is typically in Fortin's style.

Rantiére and Fortin live close together in neighboring villages. Their continuous collaboration not only adds an extra charm to this art environment, but is also quite unique in the field of art environments, which in general mostly knows isolated working self-taught artists.