Sculptures

Superheroes: “Nursing Home”, 2002, and “A very Old Thing”, 2015.

It was while reading Francis Masse (Les Deux du Balcon) that Gilles Barbier discovered that Mickey, Walt Disney’s little mouse, gets younger as he ages. Francis Masse demonstrates this with drawings. Benjamin Button syndrome? Surprised, he looked up the date of birth of the famous rodent and found a year: 1928. Mickey was therefore 72 years old. And yet, in the United States, works become public domain 95 years after their first publication. Mickey is happy, rejuvenated and close to liberation. He feels like he’s growing wings. The end of copyright, the end of the straitjacket in which he has been imprisoned for so long, will soon be effective. Mickey is going to be free! But the American government, anxious to protect the juicy business that copyright protects, decides to extend the rights period by 20 years (the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act for fans). With the cards thus reshuffled, the poor beast was not to be released from his condition frozen in codes and contracts until the canonical age of… 115! Old man. People under copyright are held in attitudes and forms that imprison them in fixed scenarios, like porn actresses. No freedom, no emancipation will be allowed. House arrest for fictional creatures is set at 115 years. Monstrous legislation. Barbier wrote down on a piece of paper: Making Superheroes at the age of their copyright.

A few years later, in 2002, he decided to produce the resulting work. Superman was then 70, Wonder Woman 65… He produced six of the Marvel universe’s most iconic characters: Rubber Man, Cat Woman, Hulk, Captain America, Wonder Woman and Superman, using hyper-realistic techniques to cast their bodies on people the exact age of their copyright. Thus was born “L’Hospice”. The installation met with some success. It was exhibited in Switzerland, New York, Miami, Tokyo and finally, in 2009, in Paris, for “VRAOUM! Trésors de la Bande Dessinée et Art Contemporain”, at the Fondation Antoine De Galbert.

In 2015, Gilles Barbier will produce one last tired Super Hero. “A Very Old Thing”, from the Fantastic Four. But The Thing is made of rock. Not being made of flesh, its age is that of old stones. Lilies, weeds, ferns and molds are slowly burying Benjamin Grimm in his armchair, and in oblivion.