iMusée d'Art Moderne de Paris (MAM)16e arrondissement
Simone Fattal: Des villes au fond d'un lac
Major retrospective of Lebanese-American artist Simone Fattal, around one hundred works over fifty years, from early landscape paintings to ceramics and collages.
More in Paris
The newest figure here is Humbaba, made in 2026: the guardian of the cedar forest, killed by Gilgamesh and Enkidu in the oldest epic we have. He stands beside La forêt, a run of large black-ink drawings of trees, and for Fattal his death speaks to how we treat the environment now.
About a hundred works cover fifty years, grouped by theme rather than date. You walk in on her first Beirut canvases from 1969 and 1970, soft reds and blues taken from her father's rugs, then meet the clay warriors she began in the 1990s out of Lebanon's civil war. At the centre sit about thirty books from The Post-Apollo Press, which she founded after a publisher rejected a poem by Etel Adnan, her partner.
Sortiraparis found the route sometimes surprising but not always easy at first sight: read the wall texts. Tickets are €14, €12 reduced, free under 18. Thursdays run until 21:30, and booking ahead is strongly recommended.
Look for
Humbaba (2026)
Look for the new ceramic guardian of the cedar forest from the Epic of Gilgamesh, shown with Fattal's large black-ink tree drawings La forêt (2023).
Le Mont Sannine (1979)
A mountain painted in shifting whites and pinks from her eleventh-floor Beirut studio, closed off with one final line of red chalk.
The warriors
Stylised clay fighters that grew out of the Lebanese war: a large group stands alongside smaller wounded warriors and young standing men.
La Suite en jaune N.1 (2016)
Black ink drips that read like calligraphy, with yellow paint filled in carefully between the marks afterwards.
The Post-Apollo Press shelf
About thirty books from the press she ran from 1982 to 2017, choosing the texts and designing the covers herself.
Good for
- Evening Visits
- Going Solo
- Nerding Out
Skip if
You want art that reads at a glance: one reviewer said the route needs its wall texts.
With kids
Under-18s go free. The exhibition is accessible to visitors with reduced mobility.
Free in the same building
- La Danse (Henri Matisse)Henri Matisse's monumental dance murals, including La Danse de Paris, shown in the museum's dedicated Salle Matisse alongside the unfinished first version.
- La Fée Électricité (Raoul Dufy)Raoul Dufy's monumental 600 m2 mural, one of the largest paintings in the world, traces the history of electricity through 110 scientists and inventors; created for the 1937 Exposition.
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Image credits
9
- Simone Fattal: Des villes au fond d'un lacPhoto : François Doury © Adagp, Paris, 2026
- The Chamber of Echoes: The Blue of EverythingPhoto credit : Charles Villa
- Céleste Richard-Zimmermann: Not All Columns Have a Heart of StoneCéleste Richard Zimmermann, Martyre décorum, 2021 - Work supported by the Pays de la Loire Region. Photo: Gregory Valton © Adagp, Paris, 2026
- You and Your GangCourtesy of the artist. Photo credit: Sam Basu
- Musée d'Art Moderne de Paris (MAM)Lustucrucaca / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Palais de TokyoGuilhem Vellut via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0
- Palais Galliera - Musée de la Mode de ParisJoe deSousa / Wikimedia Commons, CC0
- Musée national des arts asiatiques - GuimetLionel Allorge / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0
- Musée du quai Branly - Jacques ChiracJean-Pierre Dalbera, CC BY 2.0