PARIS (AP) 鈥� The oldest bridge in Paris looked Thursday as if it had been swallowed by a mountain.
The transformation is the work of JR, the street artist known as the 鈥淔rench Banksy,鈥� who this week began over the Pont Neuf, turning the 17th-century bridge that has carried Parisians across the Seine for more than 400 years into a rocky illusion rising over the river.
JR has said the idea of , is to bring 鈥渕ineral and nature鈥� back to the heart of the city. He says he is not covering the bridge so much as revealing the stone taken from limestone quarries from which Paris itself was cut.
A jagged mass of gray rock now seems to rise over its arches. From downstream, the landmark appears to have vanished beneath a prehistoric cliff, its stone openings transformed into dark cave mouths above the water.
鈥淚 thought, 鈥榃here has the bridge gone?鈥欌�� said Marie Leclerc, 62, who stopped on the quay on her way to work. 鈥淚t鈥檚 strange because you know it鈥檚 fabric and air, but from here it really looks like stone. Paris feels suddenly ancient again.鈥�
The inflation, carried out overnight after being delayed by bad weather, is the most dramatic stage yet of a project more than a year in the making.
鈥淚t鈥檚 a gigantic puzzle that has just been finished,鈥� JR told The Associated Press at the bridge as his team prepared to pump in the air. 鈥淲e鈥檙e going to send air inside, and all these rocks will rise into the Paris sky, almost 18 meters high. Once they鈥檙e inflated, they stay.鈥�
One of the 鈥� funded by the sale of JR鈥檚 work and a handful of corporate partners 鈥� it does not open to the public until June 6.
The transformation has been documented by the AP since March with time-lapse cameras, including one fixed on a rooftop terrace high above the river, watching the bridge slowly disappear day by day.
From the outside, the installation looks like a rocky mass that 鈥渓iterally鈥� breaks the landscape, said JR, who is famous for pasting enormous photographs on buildings, walls and rooftops around the world. He is often compared to the British street artist Banksy for the style of his work.
鈥淯sually everyone crosses here without looking,鈥� said Julien Moreau, 34, taking photos from near the Seine River. 鈥淭his morning everyone was standing still. That鈥檚 already the artwork.鈥�
JR said he wanted Parisians to do something unusual on their most famous bridge: stop.
鈥淲e鈥檙e all a bit stressed. We want it to work,鈥� he said, as workers in harnesses readied the structure. 鈥淏ut that鈥檚 the beauty of a project like this 鈥� its fragility, the fact of working in the street, exposing yourself to everyone.鈥�
Some passersby, he added, 鈥渨ill walk by without even realizing it鈥檚 rising. Others will be completely amazed.鈥�
The structure is 120 meters (393 feet) long and 18 meters (59 feet) tall 鈥� as high as a six-story building.
Yet it is built almost entirely from air 鈥� 80 fabric arches filled with 20,000 cubic meters of it 鈥� and weighs only about five tons.
JR鈥檚 engineers spent weeks testing the structure in a hangar at Orly airport, simulating a cut to the air supply to be sure the inflatable rock would hold its shape.
The fabric was hand-stitched by 25 artisans in a village in Brittany.
Visitors will be able to walk for free through a long, dark tunnel that lets in no daylight. 鈥淵ou enter into the darkness,鈥� JR said, 鈥渁nd emerge into the light on the other side.鈥�
He described it as a journey each person is free to take in their own way: 鈥淢any people will pass through this cave and let their imagination dictate what they feel.鈥�
The artwork is a tribute to a Parisian artistic legend.
In 1985, artist and his wife, Jeanne-Claude, wrapped the same bridge in pale golden fabric 鈥� 13 kilometers of rope, a decade of arguing with city hall, three million visitors in two weeks.
The act helped invent the idea of monumental art in modern cities. A square beside the bridge now carries their names 鈥� and it is from there that visitors will step into the dark.
鈥淚t鈥檚 pretty hard to go after them,鈥� JR said.
The cave is also a warning. JR built it as a nod to Plato鈥檚 allegory, in which prisoners mistake shadows on a wall for the real world.
鈥淲hat are our caves today? Our phones,鈥� he said. 鈥淏ecause we believe that our algorithm on social media is the reality.鈥�
Then he walks straight into the contradiction: to enter his cave about screens, visitors raise their phones.
The tech company Snap has built an augmented-reality layer that shows what the eye cannot.
The sound is a low, mineral hum from Thomas Bangalter, formerly of Daft Punk 鈥� who was 10 the year Christo wrapped the bridge.
The cave will be open around the clock from June 6-28, closing the bridge to traffic and visible from the quays, from passing boats, even from the top of the Eiffel Tower.
It will coincide with , World Music Day and the all-night Nuit Blanche arts festival.
When it comes down, the fabric will be reused or recycled.
Then, like the golden wrapping over 40 years before, the cave will be gone 鈥� and the Pont Neuf, older than the republic and older than the revolution, will reappear exactly as it was.
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Associated Press journalist Oleg Cetinic contributed from Paris.
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