Catherine Gran
Nécropole de Barbie, 2024
Ink on paper

In Nécropole de Barbie, Catherine Gran transforms a global icon of beauty and fantasy into a quiet funerary vision. A winged figure collapses over a stone pedestal engraved with the name “Barbie,” surrounded by bare trees and winter branches. The polished optimism usually associated with the character gives way to stillness, fragility, and mourning.

Gran’s meticulous ink technique lends the work its emotional depth. Through delicate cross-hatching and subtle tonal contrasts, bark, feathers, stone, and flesh are rendered with equal sensitivity. The precision of the drawing heightens the contrast between the monumentality of the setting and the vulnerability of the figure.

The work reflects on idealization, fame, and the passing of cultural dreams. Barbie is no longer presented as product or heroine, but as a symbol subjected to time. Gran suggests that even the most perfected icons ultimately enter memory, where they survive in altered and more human form.