The Pont Neuf is the oldest bridge in Paris, France. For a season, the cobblestone icon has been transformed. Take a step from the bright riverfront into a dark passage with pillars and fissures that look like limestone. Sniff the air. It smells of soil after rain, damp stone, and cellar walls. Listen closely. There are low rumbles, echoes, and pulses. Yet the space is made largely of fabric and air.
A French street artist known as JR created La Caverne du Pont Neuf. The artificial cavern opened June 15. Visitors can enter for free any time day or night through June 28.
Pont Neuf means “New Bridge,” but it was completed in 1607. People tend to pass over the bridge without much thought. JR’s installation asks folks to experience the familiar crossing through their eyes, noses, ears, and feet.
The printed fabric is made to resemble Lutetian limestone, which is quarried from underground basins in Paris. The city’s Pont Neuf, Notre Dame, and Louvre museum were all constructed from this stone.
Olfactory expert Sarah Bouasse created two shifting scents. She drew on geosmin and isoborneol. Those compounds are associated with the aroma released when rain strikes dry ground.
The smells change along the crossing. The first whiff is of wet soil and mineral dampness. Then guests encounter something warmer, smokier, and faintly animal.
Thomas Bangalter, who used to be in an electronic music duo, made the sound effects.
“Usually, I cross here without looking up once,” says Michel Dupré, a 67-year-old retiree. He blinks as he emerges into daylight. “Today, I felt the stones under my feet. And smelled them too. It makes you walk like a child again.”
Visitors raise their phones to activate an augmented-reality experience developed with a tech company. Digital bats trail light through the cave. Passing bodies leave ghostly traces. A dancer materializes.
From suppliers to workers to engineers, it took 800 people to “contribute to the artwork’s success,” according to JR’s website. La Caverne du Pont Neuf measures 393 feet long and almost 66 feet wide. The highest points of the structure range from 39 to 59 feet. The peak is roughly the height of a six-story building.
The installation pays tribute to artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude. They wrapped the Pont Neuf in golden fabric in 1985. The event drew an estimated three million visitors.
Their work covered the bridge in light. JR sends visitors into darkness.
JR also considered Plato’s allegory of the cave when he constructed the project. The ancient Greek philosopher described chained prisoners in a cave who mistake shadows for reality. They move from ignorance to knowledge when they escape into sunlight.
The artist’s website says he seeks to accompany a movement that invites citizens “to abandon blindness and isolation.”
“You enter into the darkness,” he says, “and emerge into the light on the other side.”
I have come into the world as light, so that whoever believes in me may not remain in darkness. — John 12:46