Imagined by artist-designer Michaël Feneux for the 14th edition of the International Bois Construction Forum at the Grand Palais in Paris, February 2025, the totem called Tear of Midas is only now coming to life.
THE zomes represent a recent biomimetic construction method invented in the USA about fifty years ago. France has adopted the approach over the last few decades, quite marginally. The artist-designer Michael Feneux, a student of the French Zomes school, works both as zone designer and as an artist using the art of zomic design to create surprising works. As the load descent of these works works more or less through diamonds, the final circular structure can become, as in the case of the Tear of Midas, an incredible lacework of wood, particularly striking when seen from above.
The 12 m Tear of Midas, finally erected and real in the Espace Ventadour parking lot. © Michael Feneux
A masterpiece and its setting
Like the 14th edition of the International Wood Construction Forum took place in February 2025 in a renovated Grand Palais where the large nave has mezzanines, and the architecture of the 1900 glass roof dialogues very well with a biomimetic approach, it was ideal to create directly under the dome of the glass roof a structure whose four legs were somewhat reminiscent of a 21st century counter-Eiffel Tower. And that the mezzanine showed in all its aspects, in a magical environment.
Tear and tear
Michael Feneux drew his Tear of Midas : Midas is so greedy that the Gods condemn him so that everything he touches becomes gold. He can therefore no longer eat. He cries. And what happens to his big tears, do they also turn into gold? For the test attempt at the Grand Palais, not yet. The transition from drawing to reality was laborious. BarthèsBois, partner of the Forum totems since 2015, transcribed the drawing by Michaël Feneux on Cadwork. It appeared that the structure’s own weight deformed and made it ugly. It was so difficult to find solutions respecting the beautiful lines of the project that at one point, the adventure shifted towards a 6 m teardrop proposed by the Compagnons du Devoir, without any link with a zomic design. This Tear served its purpose in February 2025, in the heart of the Forum, as a beacon of Innovations Tribune.
Around Michaël Feneux, and in front of the container leaving for Nevada, the pre-assembly team for La Larme in Égletons, a real source of pride! © Michael Feneux
Rebound at Égletons
It was a question of going to the end of the road for the consecutive edition, for which the artist preferred to present another work, the Belajò, with an exceptional diameter of 13 m, and which did not find its place in Milena Karasheva’s scenography for the 15th edition of the Forum in February 2026. Stubborn, theartist Michaël Feneux has not abandoned any of his designs. Confident in his actions and supported by a specialized design office, he took care to bring together industrial partners around him for both projects, including Thierry Farges who played for the Tear of Midasa major interface role with the cluster from the woods of Égletons.
Burning Man Or Burning Planet ?
Above all, the artist was able to catch the eye of French representatives of architecture, to the point of being put in contact with the organizers of the American Burning Man festival. The latter decided to expose the Tear, which has just been pre-assembled in Égletons in the Espace Ventadour parking lotwith a height of 12 m and some base reinforcements which are necessary for transport in a container to Nevada and exposure in the middle of the desert with the risk of strong winds.
Michaël Feneux, representative of new French wood construction, at the next Burning Man in Nevada. © Michael Feneux
A round trip?
In principle, the projects exhibited at Burning Man are all burned at the end of the festival. This time, it’s about repatriate the Tear to Égletonsas this project is iconic for the cluster French wood. In other words, all of a sudden, that pile of wood becomes a valuable item. It will represent the new wave of wood construction French in the middle of Nevada, and certainly arouse admiration. It will draw attention, not only to the well-known areas there, and to the mastery of Michaël Feneuxbut on the French wood construction resourcesTHE cluster ofÉgletons and his handsome Douglas.
Change the habitat and quickly!
There was Hermione, now there is Tear of Midasinfinitely more economical and undoubtedly reaching another audience, possibly younger. However, in France, the zomes revolution is still on probation. Let’s imagine that we take the ZAN seriously and that habitats are created in zome so as to avoid the concrete slab, allow future renaturation while using local resources. The small village of Zomes, this new Gallic village, has so far only aroused sarcasm. Of course, this does not fit well into the world of our residences of individual houses with gable roofs with single-layer plaster facade, garage and garden. Wooden builders swear by off-site, but in 2D, possibly in 3D of boxes, but not in an elegant, resilient and user-friendly biomimetic approach. The adventure of the Tear is underway but so is its political message. And it is entirely conceivable that it will return to Égletons not to rot in the middle of a roundabout, but as an inhabited beacon of a real eco-district.
Jonas Tophoven / © Michaël Feneux
