A golden arch is connecting both towers of the west facade as a sign of unity and triumph over the flames. This arch is standing for our conscious interconnectivity on planet earth. The hot air balloon Flying Udder is highlighting the feminine aura of Notre-Dame as an outstanding power of our present time. This proposal includes the idea of a roof forest of Vincent Callebaut covered by the eco-friendly rooftop design with solar-powered recycled glass spire.
Golden Arch for Notre-Dame
In a collective book “15 avril 2019. visions d'artistes”, éditions jannink Paris invites 44 artistic to propose visions for the restoration of Notre-Dame, after being damaged from a massive fire in spring 2019. Barbara Anna Husar’s contribution reminds us the feminine nature of “Our Lady of Paris” and calls for symbolising care as the lesson one needs to take home from this tragic event.
Husar uses mixed media on paper to picture a past future yet to be re-realised. At the first glance, the art work brings old memories into the future by a gentle and careful colouring of a black and white image of the Notre-Dame. A present that does not exist now, but did once before; and a future that is built on memories of the past so that it manoeuvres its present now.
Barbara Anna Husar proposes three simple but interconnected design elements: a yellowish arch that connects the two towers to one another; a green rooftop by Vincent Callebaut that supports a green technology for the future life of Notre-Dame ; and a cow breast shape hot air balloon that she brings from her “Flying Udder” (2018) project, which is a social sculpture that aims to represent the emerging contemporary change in values due to environmental concerns. The balloon’s form however, nourishes femininity and the human-environment interactions that lead to transformation of both. On the left side of the building there are two signifiers: a message saying “passage of higher vibrational choices”; and a multiplicity of forms carefully measured in a geometrical logic. These rather questionable symbolic values make the image like a snap of a vivid dream in the state of becoming.
Juxtaposing all these elements, Husar’s intervention in the building reflects connectivity and an urge for bridging the past to the future in order to overcome the present. The flying object here symbolises both, care and lack of caring in our time that leads to disastrous events such as environmental degradation and the burning of Notre-Dame. The hot air balloon also has a historical relevance to Paris as it was first invented there.
https://husar.solar/notre-dame