In 2017, Pierre Yovanovitch met Alicja Kwade, the Berlin-based sculptor best known for her enigmatic sculptures and installations that explore the intersections between time, space, science, and philosophy. The two bonded instantly, and went on to work together shortly after they were introduced, with Yovanovitch commissioning Kwade to create an original piece for Fabrègues’ gardens in Provence. The resulting planet-like, stone sculptures are scattered around the estate seemingly coincidental. They imply a “heavenly” gesture, as if a higher being played marbles with these planet-like spheres, creating another universe. This poetic concept nearly recreates a double reality. The heavy stone globes seem like floating planets lying on this little world. The arrangement also reminds of billiard breaks, since the reaction of the billiard balls is used to visualize phenomena of quantum physics. The spheres are made of natural stones coming from the various continents of our Earth for which they also symbolize. The stone material itself, with its various layers that have formed over several million years and make it possible to determine its age, acts as a kind of timescale. They reference descriptions and illustrations of the many-worlds interpretation which implies that all possible alternate histories and futures are real, each representing an actual world or universe.
