In the rugged heights above Cannes, a dialogue between French sculptor Olivia Cognet and the organic architecture of Jacques Couëlle redefines the boundaries of domestic space

To arrive at Dragon Hill is to enter a realm where the distinction between the terrestrial and the tectonic dissolves. Here, nestled within the verdant, sun-scorched scrubland, sits the Landscape House—a masterwork of Jacques Couëlle, the architect-sculptor who championed "habitation-sculpture." It is within this series of enveloping curves and rock-hewn niches that Olivia Cognet has staged her latest intervention, a collection of works that do not merely sit within the space, but breathe with it.

Cognet, a Vallauris-based sculptor whose practice oscillates between the functional and the monumental, has long resisted the tidy categorizations of the design world. Trained in ceramics but fluent in the languages of stone, lava, and wood, her work treats the domestic interior as a territory to be sculpted. At Dragon Hill, this philosophy finds its most profound resonance. Cognet’s pieces—bas-reliefs that mimic the geological stratification of the Côte d’Azur, tables that resemble archaic monoliths—act as extensions of Couëlle’s organic vision. "I chose to listen to the house," Cognet explains, referencing the cavities and irregular volumes of the Couëlle residence. This sensitivity is manifest in the exhibition’s centerpiece: a sculptural tapestry sofa, created in collaboration with the Lyon-based upholsterer Degut. Nestled into a living room niche, the piece transforms the act of sitting into a sensory engagement with architecture, its tactile surface echoing the hand-modeled plaster of the walls.

Beyond the threshold, the exhibition spills into the sculpture park. A garden lounge, conceived as a constellation of massive, mineral forms, creates a tension between the primitive and the contemporary. These are functional objects, yes, but they possess the presence of artifacts unearthed from the soil. They reflect Cognet’s deep admiration for the synthesis of arts—a lineage that traces back to Le Corbusier, Constantin Brancusi, and the spatial concepts of Lucio Fontana.

Working from the former studio of Roger Capron in Vallauris, Cognet is a custodian of a specific Mediterranean modernism. Yet, her work feels urgently current. In an era of mass-produced minimalism, her obsession with materiality and the "poetry of the everyday" offers a compelling alternative. To inhabit a Cognet sculpture is to reclaim the home as a site of artistic experience, a place where the wall is not just a boundary, but a surface to be modeled, painted, and felt. “Inhabiting the Landscape House” is running now, through November 2026. 

“Inhabiting the Landscape House”
May 13 – November 2026
Dragon Hill Residence
Castellaras le Neuf
06730 Mouans-Sartoux