The French artist Léo Caillard has found and maintains an artistic interest in intertwining our perceptions of historic past and new present with his Stone project, - who previously ‘Dressed’ classical figures from the louvre’s sculpture collection in current outfits. By depicting classical sculptures cloaked in the immediately recognisable garb Léo Caillard leads us to question just how easily swayed we might be by someone’s outward appearance. Either that or ancient Rome was quite a lot like modern Dalston.

Now, Léo Caillard has looked towards super heroes — pop culture paradigms — as the protagonists for a series of sculptural stone busts. Subverts the usual origin of stone busts with a contemporary view. Traditionally, antique statues represent heroes of the classical period, depicting mitological figures like Zeus, Hercules and Athena. ‘One day, the heroes of our modern period may be also turn into stone figures fixed for eternity,’ muses Caillard. 

Batman, Superman, Spiderman, Iron Man, Captain America and Flash are immortalized as stone busts and set within a gallery setting, surrounded by figures from the classical age.

Description of the exhibition by Museum of Contemporary Art in Krakow (MOCAK)

Art in Art is another exhibition in MoCAK series that confronts important areas of life with their perception by artists. This exhibition will, however, differ from the others. The previous themes were ‘taken from life’ and analysed received truths and manipulations thereof. History showed the drama of war, patriotism and national identification. Sport revealed human ambition and potential. Economy warned against the power of money and its ubiquity. Crime probed the evil that is in us. Gender projected the prejudices related to gender. Medicine demonstrated the complexity of body addiction. Each of these topics has proved a direct source of existential symbols, which one can employ in one’s own commentary on the world that we have been condemned to live in. They delineate the limit of our functioning and mark out the extent of our freedom and dignity but also our iniquity. As for Art – it has no power to influence our lives directly.

Art is there to provide reflection and both stimulate and provide depth to our critical perception of everything that existence entails. Such is the role of art, and this is the kind of art that MOCAK endeavours to show in all its activities. But art also has another, more ‘arty’ face – as one big conglomeration of familiar images of acclaimed pedigree, works with their own idiosyncratic context, in which they have thrilled and enraptured many. This collection includes masterpieces, representations of famous characters, specific compositional games and expressions and great scandals. Images taken ‘from art’ have considerable semantic capacity; each is a quotation as potent as a short text. Thus, artists frequently avail themselves of the art of others, for a variety of reasons, since this is an operation that can service all themes. The exhibition Art in Art does not wrestle with any particular existential problem but rather illustrates a sophisticated semantic game that is capable of dealing with a variety of issues. For this very reason, previous exhibitions in the series included works that contained ‘art in art’.

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Artists
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Elise Ansel, Krzysztof M. Bednarski, Rafał Bujnowski, Léo Caillard, Enrique Chagoya, Vuk Ćosić, Oskar Dawicki, Sven Drühl, Edward Dwurnik, Pola Dwurnik, Marian Eile, Roberto Fassone / Valeria Mancinelli, Simon Fujiwara, Tezi Gabunia, Dorothee Golz, Manfred Grübl, Aneta Grzeszykowska, Debora Hirsch, Wlastimil Hofman, Ewa Juszkiewicz, Alexandra Kehayoglou, Jerzy Kosałka, Katarzyna Kozyra, The Krasnals (Whielki Krasnal), Tomasz Kręcicki, Zofia Kulik Robert Kuśmirowski, Isabelle Le Minh, Anka Leśniak, Leszek Lewandowski, Łódź Kaliska, Marcin Maciejowski, Marcello Maloberti, Shahar Marcus, Hiroyuki Masuyama, Bartek Materka, Yasumasa Morimura, Bjørn Nørgaard, Shinji Ogawa, ORLAN, Tanja Ostojić, Géza Perneczky, Zbigniew Pronaszko, Quayola, Adam Rzepecki, Nicola Samorì, Christian D. Schmit, Cindy Sherman, Nedko Solakov, Henryk Stażewski, Jana Sterbak, Mateusz Szczypiński, Grzegorz Sztwiertnia, Mariusz Tarkawian, Gavin Turk, Richard Tuschman, Hans Weigand, Wiktor Wolski, Michał Zawada and Aaron Zeghers
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Curators
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Delfina Jałowik. Monika Kozioł. Maria Anna Potocka
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Location
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Museum of Contemporary Art in Krakow. Lipowa 4, 30-702 Krakow, Poland
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Duration
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28 April 2017 to 1 October 2017
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Leo Caillard represents the new generation of emerging artist with his singular vision. Overlapping Art work, technology, and imagination, his meticulously crafted creations combine a delicate intertwining of the new and the historic. Caillard invites us to rediscover & question our social environment with a lightness of touch, humour & sensitivity.

His "Hipsters in Stone" series was widely viewed on line & subsequently, since 2012, it has featured in many international art fairs. The body of work reassigns the classical figures of the Louvre's extensive sculpture collection in today's contemporary attire.
This series follows the theme of Caillard... "Surprise" : The viewer is drawn to the familiar within the image, but closer inspection reveals many layers of incongruous information. This collision of elements forces the observer to question his assumptions & question the roles of the subjects presented.

In 2015, Caillard has truly opened the doors to the Art of the twenty first century.

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Published on: July 13, 2017
Cite: "Art in Art, Leo Caillard immortalises in stone the comic book superheros" METALOCUS. Accessed
<https://www.metalocus.es/en/news/art-art-leo-caillard-immortalises-stone-comic-book-superheros> ISSN 1139-6415
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