April 11–September 20, 2026 – Visit the exhibition “In the Rain: Painting, Living, and Dreaming” at the Rouen Museum of Fine Arts to see student work from the research and creation workshop “Living in the Rain,” led by Sophie Cambrillat, architect, and Dominique Lefrançois, sociologist, both lecturers atENSA Normandie.
From an architect’s perspective, rain raises a multitude of issues—ecological, aesthetic, and technical—including the need to control its flow and storage. This renewed perspective on inclement weather encourages us to reexamine the connections between humans and their environment, the city and nature; to imbue built structures with greater materiality to bring out the sensibilities of the places and the people who inhabit them; recognizing also that water, though long rejected, has not always been so, and is in fact at the heart of our imaginations and mythologies.
The students whose work is brought together in this exhibition in the form of a journal—reflecting the diversity of research approaches—have drawn on surveys conducted with city dwellers interviewed on the street, as well as explorations of anthropology, philosophy, history, and other geographical and economic contexts. They emerged with several proposals, many of which highlight what we may not necessarily know: architects of the younger generation demonstrate a certain form of commitment; the furniture and installations they have sketched out are intended not only to help us live with the rain but also to reclaim the outdoors and, beyond that, to reinvent our relationship not only with the environment but also with time (both the weather and the passage of time); to better conceive of the relationships that living beings can maintain with nature; and the relationships between people, within or through public space.
The scale of street furniture to foster a deeper connection with water and the outdoors:
The Umbrella: An Object of Resistance?
Antoine Mantelet, Quentin Monsauret, Lucas Perret
In an age of disposability and overconsumption, the status, form, and materiality of the umbrella are the subject of a historical and technical inquiry: as a standardized object, a minimalist structure, and the very essence of the smallest shelter, it could be “literally” repurposed.
Sensational Rain
Sinem Ayyildiz, Elisa Halter
In the rain, not only our senses but also our physical sensations are heightened; rain, acting as a mirror of the self, can inspire the creation of structures that serve both as shelter and as a means of self-revelation.
What if rain brought us together?
Gaétan Bouyer, Baptiste Huet, Clémence Le Calvez
These students, with a touch of ethnology, set out to revisit ancient rituals. In a Western world where rituals are fading away, architecture could facilitate this encounter, fostering at least the small ritual of gratitude or the exchange made possible by the weather.
Temporal Biophilia
Lea Barbaro, Laura Dazard, Maria Julia Jumeirah Beligon, Rose Dianne Quimora
Inspired once again by other parts of the world—specifically Asia—this group of French and Filipino students turned to cinema to explore the different ways of perceiving rain in the West and in Asia and to reconnect with the elements.
Abri– tecture
Irène Jacq-Lemoine, Théo Leprunennec
Yet in Europe alone, a significant population lives and endures the rain, as they have no permanent shelter and live outdoors. Young architects are teaming up with organizations to serve a population whose defining characteristic is that it is mobile and exposed to the elements. The students realized this when they went to interview them.
Student team: Sinem AYYILDIZ – Léa BARBARO – Maria Julia Jumeirah BELIGON – Gaëtan BOUYER – Laura DAZARD – Elisa HALTER – Baptiste HUET – Irène JACQ–LEMOINE – Clémence LE CALVEZ – LE PRUNENNEC Théo – MANTELET Antoine – MONSAURET Quentin – PERRET Lucas – QUIMORA Rose Dianne
Image © Hopi, Arizona, “Pahlik Mana” kachina – unknown Hopi artist – Excerpt from the cover of the journal *Et si La pluie nous rassemblait ?* by Gaétan Bouyer, Baptiste Huet, and Clémence Le Calvez
All the information about the exhibition HERE
