{"id":9473,"date":"2024-10-11T13:54:38","date_gmt":"2024-10-11T11:54:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.studio-gilles-barbier.fr\/project\/almost-a-hero\/"},"modified":"2024-11-06T19:36:46","modified_gmt":"2024-11-06T18:36:46","slug":"almost-a-hero","status":"publish","type":"project","link":"https:\/\/www.studio-gilles-barbier.fr\/en\/project\/almost-a-hero\/","title":{"rendered":"Almost a hero."},"content":{"rendered":"

[et_pb_section fb_built=”1″ admin_label=”Gallery” _builder_version=”4.27.2″ background_enable_image=”off” background_size=”initial” background_repeat=”repeat” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_row column_structure=”2_5,3_5″ use_custom_gutter=”on” gutter_width=”2″ make_equal=”on” _builder_version=”4.16″ use_custom_width=”on” width_unit=”off” custom_width_percent=”100%” locked=”off” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”2_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ custom_padding=”|||” global_colors_info=”{}” custom_padding__hover=”|||”][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.27.0″ _dynamic_attributes=”content” _module_preset=”8f5ee6b5-14e8-48e8-a7fd-9354fcc5b479″ max_width_tablet=”70%” max_width_last_edited=”off|phone” global_colors_info=”{}”]@ET-DC@eyJkeW5hbWljIjp0cnVlLCJjb250ZW50IjoicG9zdF9jYXRlZ29yaWVzIiwic2V0dGluZ3MiOnsiYmVmb3JlIjoiIiwiYWZ0ZXIiOiIiLCJsaW5rX3RvX3Rlcm1fcGFnZSI6Im9mZiIsInNlcGFyYXRvciI6IiB8ICIsImNhdGVnb3J5X3R5cGUiOiJwcm9qZWN0X2NhdGVnb3J5In19@[\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”3_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ custom_padding=”|||” global_colors_info=”{}” custom_padding__hover=”|||”][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.27.2″ text_font=”||||||||” header_font=”|700|||||||” header_2_font=”|700|||||||” header_3_font=”|700|||||||” header_font_size_last_edited=”off|desktop” locked=”off” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n

Almost a hero.<\/h1>\n

Superheroes<\/a> are special in that they all have a superpower. This singularity, which sets them apart from common humanity, in turn makes them short. So short that we immediately identify them by name, by costume. They have no other identity than the all-pervasive and definitive one conferred by their unique qualifier. It would seem that some of them, among the most complex and human this genre has ever produced, suffer from this narrowness. But for most, it’s the same scenario, for eternity. When Gilles Barbier tells you this story, he immediately turns to art and artists. “At the height of the Cold War, when American soft power was at its height, superheroes were springing up by the dozen. An army of body-built mule-heads, all trapped in the straitjacket imposed by their hyper-specialization. <\/p>\n

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The crazy thing is that in art, much the same thing is happening at the same time. Artists begin to produce through what has been called a gesture. An artist’s gesture, a consecrated gesture, a super gesture, endlessly recognizable and identifiable. An artist’s whole life reduced to a gesture, an approach, a technique, a posture, a concept. We have the one who takes off, the one who accumulates, the one who crushes, the one who makes dots, coulures and monochromes. For one, it’s tautology, for the other, it’s bands of color, the size of the brush… This curious propensity to reduce and isolate the artistic gesture has been given the baptismal name radicality. I have to say that if there’s one thing in the world that terrifies me and gives me nightmares, it’s this radicalism. I know the world has become fond of the instant recognition offered by this kind of hypertrophy of expression, but as an artist, I’d rather die tomorrow than submit to it. (*) <\/p>\n

A few years later, he launched a series of paintings, Les Quasi H\u00e9ros, <\/em>whose power is shaky, incomplete or simply useless, banal, even off-putting. He tells us that he prefers Sixteen Donkeys, <\/em>the hero who comes out of nowhere and simplifies reality into geometric figures. But Sixteen Donkeys<\/em>, translated into French, is Seize \u00c2nes (Pronounce Cezanne)<\/em>… <\/p>\n

(*) Interview with Vincent Berni\u00e8re (2009).<\/p>\n

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Almost a hero. Superheroes are special in that they all have a superpower. This singularity, which sets them apart from common humanity, in turn makes them short. So short that we immediately identify them by name, by costume. They have no other identity than the all-pervasive and definitive one conferred by their unique qualifier. It […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3194,"template":"","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"project_category":[27],"project_tag":[],"class_list":["post-9473","project","type-project","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","project_category-paintings"],"yoast_head":"\nAlmost a hero. - Gilles Barbier<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.studio-gilles-barbier.fr\/en\/project\/almost-a-hero\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Almost a hero. - Gilles Barbier\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Almost a hero. Superheroes are special in that they all have a superpower. 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