Frédérique Nalbandian - Durée indéterminée

A 1996 graduate of Villa Arson (Nice), Frédérique Nalbandian creates soap. She is fascinated by its various states—solid, liquid, foam, effervescence, drips, and stalactite-like formations—which she uses to express new forms that she either freezes in place or allows to evolve, thereby transforming time into a medium. Soap, being particularly hydrophilic, lends itself perfectly to all the changes the artist intends. For nearly thirty years, the artist has been developing a unique body of work in which Marseille soap, plaster, and water become the central elements of a reflection on time, life, and memory. In her work, matter transforms, alters, and regenerates, revealing a keen awareness of the world’s fragility. In the background lies a meditation on the human condition, where disappearance and metamorphosis are never at odds. The gesture of imprinting coexists with that of direct carving: hands, ears, brains, wilted roses, and modular columns make up a vocabulary of fragments that the artist molds, stacks, suspends, or allows to dissolve. This process-oriented approach has led Frédérique Nalbandian to take on spaces as varied as the Sainte-Barbe Chapel in Bruay-la-Buissière, the Adhémar Chapel in Montélimar, the Cordeliers Gardens in Digne-les-Bains, and, more recently, the Church of San Francesco in Ventimiglia. Her works are now included in several public collections, including the Frac Sud, the Gassendi Museum in Digne-les-Bains, and the Pavillon de Vendôme Museum in Aix-en-Provence. The exhibition accompanies the publication of the artist’s first monograph, *1994–2006–2025*, by Frédérique Nalbandian (Arnaud Bizalion, October 2026), which traces thirty years of research into plaster and soap. The book received support from ADAGP, SOGEDA-Monaco, and the François Fauchon Endowment Fund. Authors of the texts for the monograph: Jacques Leenhardt, “The Dreamlike Vegetations of the Amorphous”; Isabelle de Maison-Rouge, “The Persistence of Foam”; Jean-Marc Réol, “The Laboratory”; Philippe Piguet, Frédérique Nalbandian, Then and Now; Ondine Bréaud-Holland, Listening; Jacques Leenhardt, Ascent and Fall in Gravity and the Form of Hope; Sophie Braganti, Path of Roses