Read our magazines
At the Regards de Provence Museum, the exhibition " Live " de Gilles Barbier offers a unique immersion into the world of an unclassifiable artist, based in Marseille for almost forty years. A dense, free and deeply thought-out body of work, which has been built over time outside the dominant codes of contemporary art.
Born in Vanuatu in 1965, Gilles Barbier has been developing a protean practice since the 1990s, encompassing painting, sculpture, drawing, writing, and experimental installations. His works are not arranged like finished objects: they evolve, respond to one another, and transform. They advance in layers, through digressions, like a thought in motion.
With " Live "The artist highlights a common thread running through his work for over thirty years: the way we inhabit the world. Body, language, memory, and matter become spaces to explore rather than subjects to represent. The gaze thus shifts from "what" to "where," inviting us to consider each work as a territory to traverse.
The exhibition brings together around forty pieces, some created specifically for the show, others from different periods of his career. They engage in a dialogue to form an organic whole, structured around three essential dimensions: painting, the body, and time. Through these themes, Gilles Barbier explores our way of existing, feeling, and situating ourselves in reality.
His work is distinguished by an impressive formal richness, fueled by an almost obsessive creative process. Drawings, notes, protocols, experiments: each work is part of a larger system, where the precision of the gesture serves a profound reflection. Behind this density, one constant remains: a form of discreet humor, sometimes biting, always lucid.
Without ever seeking to impose a single interpretation, the exhibition allows for a sensory experience. It offers another way of looking at, of inhabiting images and, perhaps, of situating oneself in the world.
Presented simultaneously in several locations in Marseille, this exhibition is part of a larger journey dedicated to the artist, confirming his roots in the local scene as well as his international recognition.
Regards de Provence Museum
Av. Vaudoyer, 13002 Marseille
Exhibition "Gilles Barbier, living"
From April 2 to September 27, 2026
Open Tuesday to Sunday, 10am to 18pm
Full price: €8,50 (reduced prices available)
=> Saturdays April 25, May 16, June 13 & 20, September 19 at 15:00 PM : Meet, guided tour & book signing with Gilles Barbier: "A Journey into the Universe of Gilles Barbier"
To coincide with the exhibition "Habiter. Gilles Barbier," Gilles Barbier is offering exceptional guided tours. By sharing anecdotes, creative processes, and insights, he invites visitors to enter his works and experience them in a new way. A rare immersion into the heart of a demanding, precise, and profoundly unique body of work.
Regards De Provence Museum | Exhibitions of the artistic heritage of Provence and the Mediterranean
Social media coordinator
