Today is May 4th, also known as the official Star Wars Day, the perfect time to introduce you to this unusual series of portraits, Flemish in The Stars. You may have seen French photographer Sacha Goldberger’s series of Superheroes as 17th century Flemish portraits which has made its rounds on the internet several times. But did you know he created a similar series with Star Wars characters as Flemish portraits?
Star Wars Characters as Flemish Portraits
Like some photographers before him such as Hendrik Kersten and Suzanne Jongmans Goldberger chose 17th century Flemish Portraits as the inspiration for his re-imagined series of Star Wars characters.
Goldberg wondered “What if Darth Vader were born in the sixteenth century?” “what if the R2D2 had been a Baron?” and “How might Van Eyck have portrayed Princess Lea?”
FLEMISH IN THE STARS
(the text below is from the artist’s website):
Sacha’s discovery of these characters, which goes back to childhood, gave birth to a desire to re-appropriate them, to take them back to a time forming the cornerstone of modern western art.
Like Sacha wants to confront these icons of American culture with contemporary painters of the Flemish school. The collection demonstrates the use of 17 century techniques counterpointing light and shadow to illustrate nobility and fragility of the super powerful of all times.
It also invites you to celebrate the heroes of your childhood. These characters have become icons to reveal their humanity: tired of having to save the world without respite, promised to a destiny of endless immortality, forever trapped in their character.
The superheroes often live their lives cloaked in anonymity. These portraits give them a chance to « fix » their narcissism denied. By the temporal disturbance they produce, these images allow us to discover, under the patina of time, an unexpected melancholy of those who are to be invincible.
As science fiction meets history of art, time meets an inexhaustible desire for mythology which is within each of us.
See more of Sacha Goldberger’s work here.
May the 4th be with you!
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