Niki de Saint Phalle was born in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France, in 1930.
She spent her youth in New York where her rebellious character led her to change many schools. Her life in the United States was alternated with summer holidays at her grandparents, at Fillerval castle in France. Having a double nationality and cultural background contributed in her becoming a “world citizen”, polyglot and with international friends.
Niki de Saint Phalle's first solo exhibition took place in 1956 in St. Gallen, Switzerland, where she met Jean Tinguely. In 1960, Niki moved to Paris where she shared a studio with Tinguely, that later became her second husband. Starting from 1965, the artist explores feminine artistic representation and realizes life-size female figures. These works gradually took on consistency by becoming the Nanas.
Niki, with the help of her husband, worked in Garavicchio, near Capalbio (GR) in Tuscany since 1979 to create the Tarot Garden, inspired by Gaudi's Park Güell in Barcelona. Here we can find a group of twenty-two monumental sculptures, some of which are habitable, inspired by the greatest arcani of the Tarot, built in reinforced concrete and covered with a mosaic of mirrors, glasses and colored ceramics. Among her later works, we can find the Igor Stravinsky Fountain (or Fontaine des automates) in the square of Centre Pompidou in Paris.
Niki de Saint Phalle died in San Diego, (USA) in 2002.
