If, while strolling along the seafront in Marseilles, you have the impression that you are seeing a piece of the rocky coastline moving and wandering in the sea, don’t worry, you are not going crazy: this is simply Julien Berthier‘s latest artistic intervention.

Parisian artist Julien Berthier, born in 1975, is used to disrupting reality with his surreal installations that alter the landscape. With L’invisible, the title of the work that appeared in Marseille, he has done the same thing, but with a slightly different style. 

Usually his interventions are sensational and impossible to miss, such as Love Love, which reproduced a sinking boat, but this time his installation seems to play hide and seek with the landscape. This time, however, his installation seems to play hide-and-seek with the landscape, as it looks like a floating rock sailing just a few metres from the coast. 

The work was created by reproducing the texture of the rock with a compound of polystyrene and epoxy resin which was then painted and placed on a motorboat. The artist also inserted a door on top through which the structure and controls can be accessed. 

With L’invisible, Julien Berthier wants to make us reflect on the action of hiding, camouflage and going unnoticed, choices that sometimes resemble acts of resistance and survival, especially in a chaotic world based on appearances such as ours.