"Broken Column House"

(The Broken Column House at Désert de Retz, 1988. Photo by Michael Kenna.)

The Broken Column House is so named because it takes the form of a ruined classical column.

Truncated nearer to the base than the capital, jagged and riven with fissures, it was created by the aristocrat François Nicolas Henri Racine de Monville who made it his main residence during the years immediately before the French Revolution.

Nestled within the confines of Monville's private pleasure garden, the Désert de Retz, it “stands like a solitary beacon, signaling the visitor to prepare for an encounter with the bizarre.”

And what bizarre encounters.