Wednesday, December 7, 2022, Gilbert Montagné gave an interview to Gala. Blind for 70 years, the singer has agreed to reveal what his iconic sunglasses were for.
It was almost 71 years ago… On December 28, 1951, Gilbert Montagné was born when his mother had been five and a half months pregnant. In August 2016, in the show Les orages de la vie, broadcast on W9, the singer had indicated that he had quickly been admitted to the neonatal service of the Port-Royal hospital, where he had been taken care of by Professor Minkowski. Weighing only 950 grams, he was immediately put in an incubator. Claiming not to have been a desired child, he said: “They’re going to have a fourth, that doesn’t really suit them, and I found out afterwards that they had thought about an abortion, that mum had tried to find solutions. But I clung to it and I was born on December 28 at 5 and a half months pregnant and I stayed in the incubator for more than three months, until full term.“If he could see, he lost his sight due to a medical error.”What happened was that at the time, they didn’t know the proper oxygen dosage. They put too much in the incubator and it burned all the tissues, the optic nerves“, he confided.
During this interview, Gilbert Montagné had assured not to blame the doctors who had taken care of him. “How wonderful what they did, because if they hadn’t put enough (oxygen, editor’s note), I wouldn’t be here to talk to you“, he confided. On Wednesday December 7, 2022, the artist gave an interview to Nikos Aliagas, for Gala. Asked what he was hiding behind his sunglasses, he said: “I am amused by the fact that they are of no use to me, except to protect the kid that I am still somewhere.“Referring to what he sees in his private mirror, Gilbert Montagne added:”My mirror is the only mirror that doesn’t hide and that you can’t lie to. What I see is who I am, what I feel.“Finally, the host asked him about his vision for the company and the future.”We’re already in the next world, because every second that passes is different and we can’t be sure which one is coming. I remain a wisely optimistic man despite the tumults. Awareness will move the world forward“, he estimated.
Gilbert Montagné: “It gave me another form of vision”
In September 2022, on the Touche set not at my post, on C8, the singer was very optimistic about his disability. In all transparency, he had indeed made it known: “I should find it dramatic, but I don’t find it dramatic at all. It gave me another form of vision (…) It’s difficult to explain to people because they think that someone who is blind is someone in the dark, in darkness . But I don’t even know what black is, I don’t know what darkness is.“During an interview with the Quotidien du Médecin, Gilbert Montagné had already declared:”For a blind person from birth like me, blindness does not pose a major problem on a daily basis., because he knew nothing else. On the other hand, a person who suddenly becomes blind must completely relearn his way of life, and that is terribly distressing.“