Charlotte Gainsbourg was terribly affected by the death of her sister Kate Barry, who died after falling from the fifth floor of her Parisian building on December 11, 2013. Following this event, which still remains a mystery, the daughter of Jane Birkin and Serge Gainsbourg took off for New York. But after a few years, the mother of Ben, Alice and Jo Attal – who saw her elders leave the family nest – needed to find her family, returning to France. On Instagram, this June 21, 2022, it is a very nostalgic Charlotte Gainsbourg who shared a superb shot with her missing sister.
“Kate & me“, she wrote in the caption. The 50-year-old artist posted this beautiful photo where Kate Barry and her, when they were young, seem inseparable. “A few years later, I served as a model for my sister Kate, who was also getting into photography. In front of her, everything became funnier and lighter. She knew how to direct me. We were playing, we were accomplices… It was another time“, had reported Charlotte Gainsbourg about their relationship so unique.
I could have stayed there
As she continues to transform Serge Gainsbourg’s apartment, located at 5 bis rue de Verneuil, into a museum, Charlotte Gainsbourg admitted to having had a lot of trouble dealing with the disappearance of this sister she loved so much. “matter of survival, after the death of my sister, I was wasting away. I could have stayed thereshe delivered on this subject to The Obs. And then Trump, the Covid… What was I doing there? It was not my country. I needed to reconnect with France, which I love deeply.”
It is not uncommon for Charlotte Gainsbourg to pay tribute to her missing sister. Particularly active on Instagram, the companion of Yvan Attal has more than once dived into the family album to release some tender childhood snapshots. Although they do not have the same father (Kate Barry was the daughter of composer John Barry), the two sisters grew up being close, in particular by sharing long sessions of play … in a cemetery. If the death of the photographer remains surrounded by a tragic mystery, the thesis of the suicide could never be attested. Buried in the Montparnasse cemetery, Kate Barry left behind her son Roman (born in 1987).