News

Portfolio

11 décembre 2008

The portfolio keeps being for me the most appropriated way to show my photographic work. The idea of showing different series, (sometime, 12 or 14 series in the same room) makes more sense than sometime being able to show only one set of images. My work has definitively to do with this accumulation of portraits. In 2009, I’ve also had the chance to push the experimentation in my exhibition by showing in the same place some portfolios (20 x 25 cm) and 3 others different size of images (till 120 x 150 cm) . The result is more efficient, with certain images shown as icons in the middle of the series. The feeling of the individual identity in the group is clearly pushed in that way. This picture is from the show at the Atelier Devisu in Marseille. It’s also important to show the box of the portfolio and the title pages in the exhibition. It really means that the images are supposed to stay together and come from a portfolio.

My Vis voluntatis project

11 décembre 2008

These three images are dealing with my Vis voluntatis project. The two scenes almost happened at the same time… in Brazil and in China. I’m now organizing the two chapters of Vis voluntatis, with the creation of two prototypes of costumes. The first costume project is a « destaque » (the most important fantasias of the Brazilian carnival). I will take part of the carnival in Poços de Caldas with my own « destaque ». The second costume is the prototype for a character which could take part of the Chinese Opera. I’m collaborating with Frank Fan, an ex-actor of the Opera of Shanghai helping me to create a choreography of 49 Chinese soldiers wearing this costume. Without really expecting it, the performance became one of the mediums I’m now using combined with my photographic research. It’s definitively a way to push further, to get myself into this « wish to be » which ‘s been always fascinated me in all the communities. And the interaction with these communities get stronger and stronger.

Poços de Caldas, Minas Gerais, Brasil

30 octobre 2008

Invited by Marcus Togni, president of the « ligua das escolas de samba », I´ve been working since monday in the Saci-pô, samba school. I decided to focus my attention on the particular phenomenon of the fantasias (in particularm the ‘destaques’ which are usually the enormous costumes you can see on the trucks during the carnival in january). Poços de Caldas is somehow famous thanks to these amazing fantasias, no limit costumes with a big touch of kitch and surrealism: Designing a fantasia needs a strong instinct and not much concept. After this series of portraits of members of the samba school in these fantasias, I will start to design my own fantasia which will be produced before january by the workshop of the school. Following the Vis voluntatis project with the purple guards and the Bi yan series with the Chinese Opera, my fantasias will be the third chapter of this vis voluntatis project… I can tell in advance that my fantasia will be also in purple, black, yellow and white, with the medusa as the main character… vis voluntatis, eo solus intra circulum.

Rosa Liksom

22 septembre 2008

I met the Finnish writer during my 4th trip to Finland when I was working with the finnish navy on the Merisotakoulu series (see in the series). Rosa Liksom wrote the text of my STEPS book in 2002 too. Staying in her place in Helsinki, in the middle of her russian toys collection gave us the idea of a new collaboration around these toys. We talked about a story and made the choice of the toys which could be our characters. And then, I went with two assistants on the frozen ice of the sea to photograph the whole story, with my flashlight and so on. It was -35 degrees celcius… and I remember we had to bring 30 kg of ice cubes in a big bag on the sea… Thinking about it, I’m still freezing. The publisher Tammi decided to finish this book with us… A great conclusion!

Vis voluntatis performance in Brussels

22 septembre 2008

At the Galerie Les filles du calvaire… Leo Favier and Wouter Schuddebeurs, standing at the entrance last saturday. Today, Wouter told me he felt « proud, feeling better than other people » and that he « would have loved to hold some people from going in »… That’s still a real big experience for us, with its dressing protocole and this attitude we are standing for. This morning I received the registration certificate of the « Fréger Tartan »…

Orange lodges of Belfast

11 septembre 2008

I’m still with my Portraits photographiques et Uniformes, no doubt. Here’s my last series, made in Northern Ireland, this summer. After a few years of discussion, I’ve finally been invited to visit the orange lodges of Belfast. That’s quite a complex story which needs to be seen also out of the usual Catholic/protestant antagonism. I’ve visited these lodges and followed the Orange parade in Belfast, the 12th of July. My series is divided in two chapters: THE LODGE, from where the parade is starting, and THE FIELD, where the parade is stopping. The series will be online next week. I was waiting to photograph this since I started to be a photographer. Done!

The Vis voluntatis project is done

8 septembre 2008

After a few months of experimentation around this uniform, I think the work around the Vis voluntatis project is done. I’ve finally photographed 9 purple guards in the uniform. We’ll show again the performance in Brussels, the 20th, at the Filles du calvaire gallery. The next step is now the creation of a purple drummer… I’m working on it!

show at the MEM gallery

20 août 2008

3 view of my show at the MEM gallery in Osaka. The Seijinshiki portfolio (9 images) is displayed framed on the walls.