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 Antoine de Bary was born on 11th September 1936 at Bordes-sur-Arize, in the Ariège.
He attended primary and secondary schools in different towns, among them Tananarive in Madagascar, where he spent two years and where the idea of becoming a painter first came to him at the age of thirteen.
Later, in a boarding school in Normandy, he practised competitive sports and met an art teacher who directed him towards an artistic career, and that is when he decided to follow courses in an art school.
In 1956 he was admitted to the National School of Decorative Arts in Paris, and in 1960, to the Studio of Gromaire, unfortunately for a very short time only, for he had to do his military service in France and Algeria until 1962.
Meanwhile in 1957 he married Marie-Odile, who gave him two daughters, Pauline and Isabel.
In 1965 he met Jean-Luc Perrot, who initiated him into the art of working in enamelled glass in the Boussois factories.
In 1966 he met Phillip Martin, an Irish artist, who wrote the catalogue preface for his 1967 exhibition in the Kontacki Gallery in Antwerp. Antoine and Phillip have had several joint exhibitions in France and abroad.
In 1973 he left Paris to settle in Burgundy at Chaudenay. He came upon the Ecomuseum of Le Creusot, and commenced his work as a sculptor/assembler with the foundry moulds of Creusot-Loire.
In 1974 he published the Film of the Cinema, which gave rise to two multimedia exhibitions and to the project Masts for Oases.
From 1976, in the course of pursuing his personal work, and discovering identity files of Moroccan workers who arrived in France around 1939, he decided to no longer exhibit in galleries, but to create environmental exhibitions dealing with societal problems through multimedia exhibitions which would visit various towns in France and abroad.
The first exhibition Breaking Away was dedicated to the theme of immigration. The second, The White Demon with the Sun of the Last Wasteland deals with the paradox of risk =security.
From 1988, after a solo exhibition in Mali and his meeting with Alpha Oumar Konaré, came the stage of the totem masts which he has erected around the world. The masts are symbolic, and signs of a coming together. These works are situated in Mali, Quebec, Spain, and Canada. Further masts are located in Germany, France and Poland.
In 1996, he returned to Paris for a period of time.
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Solo Exhibitions:
1962, Club des Poètes, Paris  1963, Maison de la Culture, Paris 2,e 1966, Galerie Lesperut, Marseille, text by Jacques Lassaigne ; Galerie Larmitière, Rouen ; Galerie Zodiaque Genève 1967, Galerie L'Entre-monde, Paris, text by Jacques Lassaigne ; Galerie Kontackt, Anvers, text by Philip Martin ; Galerie 5, Genève ; Galerie Maya, Bruxelles 1968, Galerie del Cavalino, Venise, texte d'Hubert Juin; Galerie Kon-tackt, Anvers 1969; Galerie Kontackt, Anvers ; Galerie Bettie Thomen, Bâle 1970, C.E.D.B., Strasbourg, text by François Mathey ; Galerie Beno, Zurich -1972 ; Galerie Sada, Nîmes 1973, Galerie Frédéric Bazille, Montpellier, text by Georges Desmouliez ; Galerie Annick Lemoine, Paris 1975, Galerie municipale, Saint-Laurent-du-Jura 1979, Maison de la Culture de Chalon-sur-Saône, exhibition organised by Christian Besson 1981, Musée Niepce, Kotipatik, Chalon-sur-Saône, text by Paul Jay. Galerie Aréna, on the occasion of the Rencontres internationales de la photographie, Arles 1987, L'ARC, Le Creusot, Les boîtes à mémoire, texte de Christian Bobin 1988, Écomusée, Un artiste, un musée, Fresnes, text by Pierre Gaudibert 1991, Écomusée, Savigny-le-Temple, Fenêtres sur... 1992, Galerie Écart, Paris, Des mâts pour des oasis 1996, École spéciale d'Architecture, Paris 1997, Cité internationale des Arts, Paris, Usines Bertheau, Ivry-sur-Seine.
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"For whoever is happy to visit the studios of young artists, curious to discover what the future has in store for us, it is a very rare joy to come upon a work that is authentic. Among artists who are searching for their path it is normal to encounter influences, obsessions, a certain rawness; but this does not manage to disguise for us the character of a real personality…I believe in the generosity of painting. The work of Antoine de Bary is an affirmation of this."
Jacques Lassaigne
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"Antoine de Bary is a realistic and lyrical painter, not a surveyor of quantified reality. And we really know this when we follow from canvas to canvas the propositions of this great rhythmic curve, which both encloses and frees the painting. This rhythm is like that of an arm which, with one gesture, loses the dimensions of empty space and then summons together the houses and the fir trees, snow and rushing streams, mountains and waves. This rhythm, seen as if in a dream, constitutes the poetics of the painter."
Hubert Juin
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Collections:
Works in private and public collections both in France and abroad: Israel, Switzerland, Belgium, Italy, Canada, United States, Mali, Germany, Spain, Japan, etc.
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"The circle has been already present or could be sensed in certain canvases. But this was a very wide circle and a little blurred and in different colours, a sort of rose window in a cathedral, in which the eye drifted and let itself be soothed. Now the circle figures in every work, clear and uncoloured, small like a distant point such as summoned the shepherds and the magi. The eye looks up and yearns to go towards it."
Georges Desmouliez
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Solo multimedia exhibition:
1976 - 1978, Le film du cinéma (The Film of The Cinema)
Design of a photomontage on the wall of a cinema in La Foux d’Allos, architect Gérard Thurnauer, Edition of the book Le film du Cinéma by l’INA and Editions Hier et Demain.
Design of a photomontage for a wall in the Forum des Halles in Paris
Exhibition of the original collages on the history of the cinema at the Pompidou Centre in Paris, in Montbéliard, Avignon, Lyon, Lille etc.
The National Library acquires these original collages with the help of the Mesnil Foundation and of the French Banks.
1982 - 1985, La Rupture (Breaking Away)
A travelling exhibition, on the human phenomenon of immigration designed in environmental form and visiting Paris, Lyon, Montbéliard, Amiens, Evreux, Utrecht, Niort, Le Vaudreuil, Bourges, Dreux, Poitiers, Chalons-sur-Saône.
1985 - 1986, Le Diable Blanc avec le soleil du dernier terrain vague (The White Devil with the sun of the last wasteland)
Travelling exhibition, as a homage to a tightrope walker, designed as a large piece of sculpture and dealing with the paradox of risk=security. This exhibition visited Marne-la-Vallée, Arc-et-Senans, Mâcon…
1990 -.. ., Des Mâts pour des Oasis, (Masts for Oases)
This project was given the hallmark of the Decade of Culture of UNESCO, and the support by the D.A.P.
His personal work gave rise to a north-South dialogue in Mali and in Quebec, involving artists from these two countries in exhibitions, meetings, publications of book-objects and films. The cities involved were: Bamako in Mali, Saint-Hilaire-de-Dorset in Quebec, Molinos in Spain. Three further masts were erected in Bremen, Germany, in Cracow in Poland, and in Ouroux-en-Morvan in Burgundy.
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"It is nonetheless true that through all the canvases I know, whether they be large or small, every one of them has a particular message. Viewing each of your paintings in their own compartmentalized existence, made of interlocking forms, one feels that they are seeking to create a universe…I see in your paintings something that resembles ‘tapas’, and at the same time I recognise the presence of Matisse and that of the woven cloths of India, an entire historic and cultural world."
François Mathey
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"Here we have a naked script, without esthetic motive, without any attempt to respond to established art, born out of an authentic experience, valid and free but in spiritual union with the purest tradition. It is still possible for us to experience wonderment, to detach ourselves from our preconceived ideas, from our desire to name, to relegate everything yet again to a given category before we can look at things freely and listen to a voice which calls us towards innocence and towards the untrodden fields where Love engenders every event."
Philip Martin
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Main group exhibitions:
1965 : Biennale de Paris 1966 : galerie Zodiaque, Genève ; galerie 5, Genève ; galerie La Peau de l'Ours, Aix-en-Provence 1967 : Biennale de Merignac ; galerie Kontackt, Anvers 1968 : Biennale de SaoPaolo, Argentine ; first Art Fair of Contemporary Art, Bruxelles ; galerie Kontackt, Anvers 1969 : biennale de Merignac ; galerie Kontackt, Anvers ; galerie Pauli, Lausanne ; Mostra d'arte moderna, Camaiore 1971 : Salon de la Jeune Sculpture, Paris 1972 : participation à un symposium de peinture en Macédoine (Yougoslavie) 1973 : Salon des Réalités Nouvelles, Évry 1974 : Sous couleur de... exposition itinérante du C.R.A.C.A.P. ; galerie Kontackt, Anvers 1976 : Arc 2, Paris 1978 : Vous avez dit baleine, Maison de la Culture de Chalon-sur-Saône 1980 : Travaux sur papier, Villeparisis 1982 : Vachement Beau, musée de Dôle 1985 : Dessins en utopie, Maison de la Culture d'Amiens 1985 : Autoportrait, FR3, Lyon 1994-1996 : Erratum musical, Brème, Hanovre... 1993-1996 : Saga, Paris.
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"Photographs are ‘taken’. One ‘shoots’ pictures. Or more still, photographs are rattled off in rapid succession, machine-gun style. In days gone by, the term ferrotype ‘canons’ gave people a delicious quiver of fear. Photography has something aggressive about it. Antoine de Bary has given shape to this violence, this indiscretion by means of the softness of polished wood… he creates not so much an apparatus as a photographic ’weapon’."
Paul Jay
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"Beset on every side, Antoine de Bary is literally possessed by despair and the violence of revolt. But this is just the other side of his mad jubilation in being and creating that which he paradoxically wants to communicate to us, inviting us to journey with him in crossing through the labyrinth of hell. Out of all this creative alchemy is born a work where, fraternally echoing Vostel and Louise Nevelson, he has invented personal, plastic solutions, combining radical expressionism with architectural poetics."
Pierre Gaudibert
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Collaborations with architects:
Stained glass windows in the chapel of Childhood in Nanterre, architect Philippe Verreyy Enamelled Glass for two entrances to apartment buildings at Garges-les-Gonesses, architect Pierre-Paul Heckly Monumental Sculptures at Saint-Cyprien, architect Gérard Thurnauer Sculpture for the Gilles Barbey agency in Lausanne Fabric Wall Covering at Auchel (1996) Wall Paintings à Mâcon, Chaudenay, Strumica Photomontages in Pierre-de-Bresse, Paris, Saint-Nazaire, SaintViâtre, Argenton-sur-Creuse Public Lightings in Chalon-surSaône Window Sills in Longumeau (1 %), architect Pierre Joly Signal-Sculpture for the museum of Agricultural Machinery in Ambert.
Stage scenery:
Commission from the D.A.P., Ministry of Culture to make a back-drop for the G.R.C.O.P. Paris Opera House: choreography by Claude Brumachon, Féline, performed at the Georges Pompidou Centre in Paris and at the Opera House in Nantes.
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Works for stage and museums:
Environment for the Industrial Heritage exhibition, curator Eva Parsons of the Rikjtutsallingar, Stockholm, (1978) Graphic and Charcoal drawings (3mx2m) fro two exhibitions at the Saint-Nazaire, The trades of the Sea, and Saint-Nazaire naval base (1984) Design sequence in the exhibition Youth born of Immigration, for the C.C.I. at the Georges Pompidou Centre in Paris, (1985) Photomontages for: The Ecomuseum at la Bresse bourguignonne (1981), the Ecomuseum of Le Creusot (1980), the Museum of Popular Arts and Traditions, Paris, exhibition Family links (1990), La Maison de l’Etang in Sologne (1992), the Museum of Masculine Elegance and Shirtmaking at Argenton-sur-Creuse (1993). Exhibition: Responsible for the design of the exhibition, Muso Kunda at Bamako, in Mali, for the Partage Foundation, and layout of catalogue.
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"When he is not in Burgundy, he is traveling through Africa in the opposite direction to the Paris-Dakar motor-race: without technical assistance but with his awesome poetic sense of logistics, thereby doing less harm to the landscape even if it churns up the heart. When he is no longer in France, it is because he is crossing the Atlantic, and when he seems to be nowhere to be found, it’s because he is searching in the depths of himself in order to try to understand some little bit of other people, of every other person, of the world on the move as of man on the move in the world. "
Pierre Bongiovani
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"Antoine de Bary has wandered here and there. He has lingered in the city just as he has lingered in his mind. In the city he has discovered those empty boxes which are used to exhibit stickers. He bought a set of them, without knowing why. In his head he has found images, strips of memory. He laid them out in the bottom of the boxes. These are the stickers of ordinary life, ephemeral ‘moths’: a rose for love, a ticket for the train, a name for absence: Jean Genet . That is the name of a poet, an artist… For Antoine de Bary, things have not got a price. They have a history, a shape, and colours. He plays with them. He amuses himself with the left-overs of every day, with the crumbs under the table. In his studio there are drawings of marvellous clarity. Simple strokes of colour on fine paper. A shower of light on music paper. It’s on the threshold of this light that all these black boxes are piled and it’s just as well that it should be so. Everything is right like that, in order: blackness before light, death before birth."
Christian Bobin
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Publications:
Éd. Guy Schraenen, Anvers, Belgique : Marie-Odile (1973) - The Book as Object and Postcard (1974) - Axis (1975) - Sealed in an envelope on July14th, Colle X ion (1977)
Éd. Hier et Demain et INA, Paris : Le film du cinéma, 1978 - texts by Claude-Michel Cluny and Jean-Paul Morel
Éd. Marie-Cornet, France, 1979 - 1981 : Le temps qu'il fait - Love letters - Pen-wiper of sergeant-major Bokassa - Six items of news caught in a mouse-trap - The mirror effect
Éd. l'ARC, Le Creusot, France : La rupture, 1982, texts by Jean Genet, Tahar Ben Jelloun, Serge Moscovici, Abdelatif Laabi...
Éd. Lieux Publics, Le diable blanc avec le soleil du dernier terrain vague, 1985 - texts by Philippe Petit, Gilbert Lascault, Professeur Jean-Paul Binet...
Éd. l'URDLA, Glenn Gould, book of lithographs, 1990, Multitude et partition, 4 lithographs, 1993
L'Occitane, L'or des femmes, poster/collage, 1993
Éd. Visages, Des mâts pour des oasis, Bamako 1992, Saint-Hilairede-Dorset 1993, Molinos 1995...
Prizes :
Prix Charles Pacquement in 1966.
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