On the large jetty between Lake Saint-Louis and the canal is a garden made of 36 masts to which are attached colourful objects serving as flags. Tools, instruments, architectural elements, and signs of all sorts greet viewers who stroll among these playful flagpoles. The masts, precisely aligned in six rows like a quadrant of a Cartesian plane, are surrounded by a circular podium, a seesaw, two chairs set face to face, and a gate left ajar.

Set within a vast open space and composed of these unlikely “flags,” the installation resembles an improbable United Nations Plaza. The podium, chairs, and seesaw evoke having a voice, encounters, and friendliness. The colourful objects, practical or playful in nature, make this public area a familiar place where people find common symbols. Thus, the components of the artwork converge, in the spirit of bringing people together, to celebrate a sense of community.

Détour: le grand jardin results from a displacement of everyday elements into the public space to change their use. This approach is the cornerstone of Goulet’s production of works of public art, which has extended over more than three decades.

Presented for the first time, in model form, in 1994 at the second Salon international de sculpture extérieure de Montréal, the artwork was then donated to the Ville de Lachine by André Harel and installed in Parc René-Lévesque.