Robert Bibeau builds a vertical landscape on a large salvaged wood panel, its edges painted blue. Stone cliffs rise on either side toward a sky where a low sun glows, ochre and diffuse. High above the crags, off to the right, a small flock of painted birds crosses the blue. Between two pillars a tightrope walker edges along a taut wire, an open parasol held over his head for balance. Lower down, a waterfall drops through a painted forest, reaches a central pool, then runs out onto a shoreline of moss, seashells and white flowers. A green salamander flecked with yellow climbs the left bank at mid-height, modelled in relief, the only declared inhabitant of this small world.

The assembly gathers stone, bark, branches and paint. The relief is bold and reaches five to six centimetres in places, so the scene presses forward toward the viewer. Each tier stages its own scene. The whole reads from bottom to top like an ascent, from still water up to the light. The panel is large, close to a metre thirty tall, and fixes to the wall by a mounting fixture made for it. Its density of material governs the installation above all, which calls for two hands and a load-bearing wall.

Salamandre is made to be lived in. It is sold without the green plants that inhabit it in some photographs, leaving the owner to add their own and renew them with the seasons. Six containers of different sizes are built into the structure itself, edged with stone, set around the pool and along the shoreline. They take soil directly, like small planting beds, and hold a potted or planted specimen, a succulent, living moss. The choice of plants follows the light of the room where the work hangs. Hung on its own, the piece holds as a relief painting. Filled with living plants, it becomes a botanical display, a setting where floral arrangements find a backdrop of cliffs and water. This double life suits it equally to a home and to a place where living things are put on show.