Driftwood sculpture
Driftwood sculpture is very popular, but it’s not always successful. Lately, I stumbled upon one in Sallenelles in Normandy and I was stunned by its beauty and the metaphor it depicted.
I love sculpture, my readers know already about that, I have published a good number of posts on statuary et al, but here is sculpture of another kind, anything between land-art and statuary, taken at Sallenelles, a stone’s through from Merville, a place of History where one can visit the fort of Merville. The whole area is marked with what happened with the June 44 landings.

Driftwood sculpture in Sallenelles
You must picture thousands of soldiers being parachuted in this area which had been turned into marshlands by Marshal Rommel. He had ordered the dikes of the river Orne to be destroyed, thousands of soldiers drowned while landing and only a handful of brave men — the commander was an Irishman of French descent — took the fort. There, one can see a Dakota from the US Air Force similar to those which were used during Operation Overlord as it was called.
Today the area is so peaceful it’s hard to picture the scene.

Buttercups and driftwood
The area isn’t just conducive to rambles though, there’s art as well. Little did I know about that initiative as we stumbled upon this beautiful driftwood sculpture. The so-called house of Nature and the estuary of river Orne is a not for profit organisation which is planning to install many land art sculptures in their back garden. Strangely enough, their non-translated website isn’t mentioning anything about the event, let alone the name of the artist. Yet I was stunned by the beauty of this land art sculpture. Besides, I loved the metaphor of freedom (driftwood), put in a cage and out of its natural element. A metaphor for today and the past two years we’ve been through.




If you have a chance to be there in June, you should be able to see more of these land art sculptures.
- An Afternoon With Vincent Van Gogh - August 2, 2023
- Dutch angle and Dutch tulips - July 20, 2023
- She Dances Alone – Casa de Argentina en Paris - May 31, 2023
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