Le Solitaire is de naam van een kunstwerk van Théo Mercier. Het 3 meter hoge monster is helemaal gemaakt van spaghetti.
Door de houding (en misschien ook wel het materiaal) heeft het kunstwerk een melancholische uitstraling. Bij het zien van de sculptuur krijg je meteen een gevoel van medelijden. Op de website van Mercier kun je nog meer prachtig werk van deze kunstenaar vinden en daar staat ook een gedicht van Jerôme Lambert dat bij dit spaghettimonster hoort.
It was winters ago, without malice or grace,
It was winters ago, I still bear the trace,
That a boy changed me from what I was then
A gentle giant, without start and without end.
In the beginning, I thought: he wants the best for me,
This boy seems honest and I like his ways.
But the ways in question quickly went to hell,
And I heard in the distance toll the awful bell.
It cried: “Giant, you must take care
Not to give too much credit to the boy!
He has many talents, his hand is long and thin
But know that his heart is as prickly as a pin.”
I replied: “Shut up, you’re nothing but an old bell
It must be jealousy that is making you yell.”
All the while the child on his little school chair
Sat down my bottom, my head and my hair.
As the child grew, the bigger was my body.
As each day he added a blob to the blobby.
I saw him come in the morning, beaming,
And leave, less courageously, in the evening.
I attained a colossal and magnificent bulk
Higher than the hills that he made out of muck.
I was his most spectacular creature
Even if I was missing a certain feature.
I thought he truly wanted to make me his prize,
When eventually, he gave me two eyes.
Two eyes so sad and beautiful that nothing could say
What was hidden in this blue, twixt the sea and the day.
