François Bard Art

I am not an art critic and cannot write verbose analytical articles about artists and their work. I keep it simple. I scour the net looking for things to bring to this site, and when I do I feel like it is a small victory. A diamond in the sand. I have been following French artist François Bard for a few years. Sometimes you see art and it is interesting for a moment , but it is forgettable. With François Bard’s work, you tend to think about it. I do not tire of his work. It is the simplicity of the subject matter that is so deceiving. We all have our personal emotions to boys in hoodies. Maybe like me, this brings memories. For years, I had my son and all his friends hanging around my house in hoodies and it is a warm, familiar memory. After the first coma my late mom went into, she told me that at some point a man in a black hoodie came to fetch her on a Paris Metro station platform, and she knew it was God. She asked to stay another while. When she went into the next coma, she decided to go with the “hoodie” man. A man in a hoodie- in SA, maybe internationally- is a scary thing to see in the middle of the night. The CCTV footage we so often see on social media of robberies and shootings, are of men in hoodies. It is a simple clothing item. But our perceptions of them may not be. Great art is where you think you are seeing something simple, yet it is complex. The beauty of these large scale paintings is the traditional techniques used, but it is deceptive in its simplicity. I added an interview at the bottom of the post, where the artist explains his work and thought process.