Gilles Barbier
Galerie Georges-Philippe & Nathalie Vallois
What do artworks think about? What do they dream of while hanging in the museum, seeing us walk past them—at times rushed or indifferent—when all they are trying to do is catch our eye and hold our attention? And what curious, vulgar, or abstruse thoughts come to their minds when we stand fixedly before them for long minutes, or then again at night, when the museum is emptied of all visitors? Such questions may seem ridiculous yet become decisive in the face of works like Jeff Koons’s mirrored Rabbit, 1986, for example, and they are at the heart of the sculptural work of Gilles Barbier as well.