┐ Taiyo Onorato & Nico Krebs └

@ Taiyo Onorato & Nico Krebs, untitled, from the seriesLight of other days, 2009

DIRECT POSITIVE PHOTOGRAPHS, 20 X 24 CM EACH

@ Taiyo Onorato & Nico Krebs, untitled, from the seriesLight of other days, 2009

DIRECT POSITIVE PHOTOGRAPHS, 20 X 24 CM EACH

In “End of an Era” Onorato and Krebs continue to explore the nature of perception, a theme that also distinguishes their most well-known photographic series to date, “The Great Unreal,” produced during their travels through the US. Their illusionistic visual universes and installations thrive on the interplay between the visible and invisible nature of illusion and the encounter of reality and the imagination.
The exhibited photographs and installations reflect the ambivalent role of photography on one hand as a documentary medium used to depict reality and on the other hand as an artistic instrument for the creation of new, dream-like imaginary worlds. The exhibition title “End of an Era” refers to the value of analogue image production, the end of which is constantly being prophesied, particularly since the demise of the pioneer of photography, Kodak.(…)

from here

Their work, very much worth exploring, can be found here

┐ Jacqueline Aeberhard └

© Jacqueline Aeberhard, Untitled, from the series Visitation, 2011 (work in progress)

© Jacqueline Aeberhard, Untitled, from the series Visitation, 2011 (work in progress)

Jacqueline’s website here

┐ Shirana Shahbazi └

© Shirana Shahbazi, Mercedes, from the series Flowers, fruits, portraits, 2008

© Shirana Shahbazi, Stilleben, from the series Flowers, fruits, portraits, 2008

Echoing statements by Roland Barthes, Shahbazi commented recently, “Photography is a simple, stupid medium.”2 In fact, photography is dumbfounding; it communicates in a purely visual language. Yet, without a frame to contextualize these visions, photography fails to speak.
Most recently for Shahbazi, that context has been the normalized cultural forms of photography, those genre images of landscape, portrait, and still life whose history lies less with photography than with painting. Yet her photographs draw our attention to the limits of those genres. With the still lifes, Shahbazi takes her cue from seventeenth-century Dutch painting, capturing natural curiosities: orchids, minerals, fruits, vegetables, and so on. Unlike her Dutch predecessors, however, she presents these vignettes floating on a monochromatic background, excised from their origins as Protestant images of exoticism. The portraits and landscapes are haunted by similar displacements. In Shahbazi’s hands, portraits of certain individuals are repeated throughout a larger sequence. Each portrait is taken from a slightly different angle. Across these movements, the viewer becomes uncertain if the artist or the sitter has changed position; identities become confused, and the photographic portrait’s sense for capturing individuality is exiled across a series of photographic events. The landscapes from Meanwhile, in contrast, are less subjective than placeless. To borrow a term used by German photographer Michael Schmidt to describe the places that he has photographed, the landscapes in Shahbazi’s photographs are irgendwo (somewhere), thus lacking particularity.3 While we cannot deny the indexical nature of her landscape photographs, we are also struck by how their sense of place escapes specificity. Despite engaging a history of representational imagery that spans many media, Shahbazi, in her use of these genre images, displaces painting’s subjectivity and historicity for photography’s immediacy.

excerpt from Chris Balaschak’s text. Full version at hammer.ucla.edu

More of Shirana’s work can be seen at gallery Bob Van Orsouw.

┐ Camillo Paravicini └

© Camillo Paravicini, Untitled, from the series Carpe Diem, 2011

© Camillo Paravicini, Untitled, from the series Carpe Diem, 2011

More of Camillo’s work here

║ Emmanuelle Antille ║

© Emmanuelle Antille, at the Leu Family’s Family Iron, from the series Leu Family’s Family Iron, 2007

© Emmanuelle Antille, Family Portrait, from the series Leu Family’s Family Iron, 2007

║ Elisa Larvego ║

© Elisa Larvego, Av. Devin-du-Village, from the series Mises à part, 2006

© Elisa Larvego, Salle de classe des Beaux-Arts, from the series Mises à part, 2006

“Ce travail est une tentative de projection de mon imaginaire dans des espaces urbains qui m’interpellent. Ces lieux deviennent des sortes de décors à mes mises en scènes, interagissant avec les figurants. Ces espaces m’attirent soit pour leurs aspects de naturel construit (ou d’artifice naturel), soit pour leur rapport ambigu entre loisir et violence. Je souhaite intriguer et instaurer le doute chez le spectateur sur la vrai-semblance des images en montrant tout l’artifice qui peut se cacher derrière une photographie à l’apparence trompeuse. Mes images sont entièrement construites afin de servir mon propos, je ne suis pas seulement spectatrice du monde extérieure. Je recrée une sorte de monde imagé où l’être humain n’est pas toujours à la place qu’on attend, ni en train de faire une action dite sensée. Mon but est de créer une tension tangible dans mes images, comme si on assistait à l’instant précédant la tragédie. Mes photographies évoluent entre absurdité et gravité. Je recherche à créer des actions figées dans une sorte de suspens crée par l’expression des visages et des corps. Les dissonances sont voulues afin de suggérer une narration possible, un avant et un après l’image. Début, fin ou suite d’une histoire à s’inventer.”

More of Elisa’s work here

║ David Favrod ║

© David Favrod, Untitled, from the series Gaijin, 2009

© David Favrod, Untitled, from the series Gaijin, 2009

“It is from this feeling of rejection and also from a desire to prove that I am as Japanese as I am Swiss that this work was created. “Gaijin” is a fictional narrative, a tool for my quest for identity, where self-portraits imply an intimate and solitary relationship that I have with myself. The mirror image is frozen in a figurative alter ego that serves as an anchor point.”

excerpt from statement

To see more of David’s work click here

║ Virginie Rebetez ║

© Virginie Rebetez, Untitled, from the series Flirting with Charon, 2008

 

©  Virginie Rebetez, Untitled, from the series Flirting with Charon, 2008 

“(In collaboration with Dienst Werk en Inkomen) 

«Flirting with Charon» was made inside houses whose owners recently died. DWI organizes the funerals of people who died socially isolated. Through them I was able to visit these places. 

Being interested in the holy aspect of these interiors and their memories, I played with our projection on them and touched their invisible borders. I used myself as a bridge to create a continuation of these dying memories.” 

More of Virginie’s work can be seen here 

 

 

 

 

║ Thomas Rousset ║

© Thomas Rousset, Untitled, from the series Prabérians, 2009

© Thomas Rousset, Untitled, from the series Prabérians, 2009

“Prabérians takes roots in a dialogue between my rural origins and my creative process as a photographer.
These images came out of a fantasy; that of a fictive rural community, lost in space and time, evolving in a dream-like French countryside. My photographs are not following a defined narration; every mise-en-scène rather tries to rebuild my memories of a rural world where the farmers’ routine is confronted with the most exotic archetypes of the peasant life.The real world is my inspiration. I make photographs with the inhabitants of my village and their animals and re-locate them in a floating reality that is timeless, unlikely and intriguing; a reality that is a blend of a raw normality and absurd exuberance.”

Really worth seeing!!!

More of Thomas’ work can be seen here

║ Elise Guillod ║

© Elise Guillod, Untitled, from the series Myths are fading, 2009

© Elise Guillod, Untitled, from the series Myths are fading, 2009

More of Elise’s work can be seen here

║ Matthieu Gafsou ║

© Matthieu Gafsou, Untitled #5, from the series Corruptions

© Matthieu Gafsou, Untitled #17, from the series Corruptions

“Corruptions aurait pu être un projet documentaire centré sur un bout de France, ouvrier, qui a subi l’effondrement de l’industrie du textile. Un travail d’initiation, dans la tradition stylistique de mes maîtres.

Les images d’une telle série n’auront jamais vu le jour. La conjugaison de mon inexpérience et de la maladresse d’un technicien a eu pour issue une altération profonde des négatifs, rendant les images totalement inexploitables pour le projet que j’ambitionnais alors de présenter. Une partie des négatifs, sous le coup de la frustration et de la colère, a fini au rebut. Le reste, fétiche amputé, a attendu dans un placard.

Il a fallu du temps pour que je saisisse la richesse de ce matériau dont je croyais qu’il était corrompu. Il a fallu peut-être apprendre à saisir un peu mieux les enjeux d’une démarche artistique, sa fragilité, sa soumission à l’accidentel malgré toutes les précautions, les intentions.

Car plus que de la mémoire des lieux, c’est la mémoire en elle-même que ces négatifs questionnent tout comme, et c’est un corollaire, le pouvoir de la photographie à fabriquer des souvenirs, à construire un passé teinté d’imaginaire dont les traces participent de la construction de l’individu et de la mémoire collective.

Mes Corruptions n’évoquent donc plus seulement le passé de lieux qui ont subi les outrages d’un bouleversement économique, d’une histoire locale, de péripéties. L’ici et le maintenant, l’anecdotique, s’en sont allés avec la précision de ces images, réalisées à la chambre. La mémoire devient le vrai sujet des images, la mémoire comme faculté de se souvenir mais aussi comme action de tronquer, de façon non intentionnelle, ce qui fut.

A ce titre, la photographie, considérée comme métaphore de la mémoire, est exemplaire. Elle en est même devenue l’outil, manière de fixer des souvenirs mais aussi de construire la fiction de nos vies. Et mes images, menacées de disparition par un accident, tronquées, infidèles, sont une façon de formuler les trahisons de la mémoire, les pièces manquantes, les raccommodages inconscients qui forgent les abris de nos histoires et de l’Histoire avec un grand H – pour autant que celle-ci existe bel et bien, ce dont je me plais à douter.”

More of Matthieu’s work can be seen here

║ Béatrice Helg ║

© Béatrice Helg, Expansion III, 2007

© Béatrice Helg, Profondeurs VIII, 2008

More of Béatrice’s work can be seen here

║ Catherine Leutenegger ║

© Catherine Leutenegger, Untitled, from the series Welcome home baby, 2008

© Catherine Leutenegger, Untitled, from the series Welcome home baby, 2008

© Catherine Leutenegger, Untitled, from the series Welcome home baby, 2008

“Welcome Home Baby is a serie of “So Truly Real Baby Dolls”. They are realistic newborn collectible dolls.”

Catherine Leutenegger

To see more of Catherine’s work click here

║ Alfio Tommasini ║

© Alfio Tommasini, from the series Antonio & Paloma

© Alfio Tommasini, from the series Antonio & Paloma

© Alfio Tommasini, from the series Antonio & Paloma

“Another day dawns on the Manzanares river. In the midst of houses, bridges, construction sites, a beer factory and a soccer stadium there is a container where Antonio and Paloma have lived for the last three years. A Spanish-Gipsy couple that came to Madrid from Asturias in the beginning of the nineties, in the search of a new life.
Antonio is 53 years old. His days are marked by the sunbeams, he has breakfast, tidies up himself and then he goes to work. He walks along Madrid his smile and his car full of scrap. Antonio is man of routine; he peddles his wares in the small street-markets all
morning and then goes home after a trip, perhaps to recover the lost levity.

Paloma is 43 years old, and, like Antonio, she makes each day as it comes. She is a housewife, one of whose principal duties is care of his husband, beside to wait him anxiously when he’s gone. In the afternoon, she rests at his side and spends hours as participant and spectator to her favourite soap operas. They have 4 children to whom every night they devote their last thought before falling asleep.

I was seeking different mode of living in the city and a glimmer that could bring to a new human relation. Destiny and luck brought me to a place where two people have opened their selves and their home to me and where time has made a strong bond of friendship. An environment, sometimes difficult, but always full of tenderness and simplicity. I have spent days and nights with them, in a space so small that it creates its own sense of intensity and intimacy.
A home that is custom made, like maybe all homes, where the quality of life depends on how you live it, and Antonio and Paloma have a love that reaches beyond the space where they open their eyes every morning.”

Alfio Tommasini

To see more of Alfio’s work click here

║ Mathieu Bernard-Reymond ║

© Mathieu Bernard-Reymond, Sans Titre nº27, from the series Disparitions, 2002

© Mathieu Bernard-Reymond, Sans Titre nº89, from the series Disparitions, 2005

“This series should have been a work on architecture, but it has evolved into a bigger spectrum. The images are often digitally manipulated. However, I like to recall that I do not incorporate external images from my computer. I just accentuate what is already there”.

Mathieu Bernard-Reymond

To see more of Mathieu’s work click here

║ Loan Nguyen ║

© Loan Nguyen, Cyprus, from the series Mobile, 2000-2009 (work in progress)

© Loan Nguyen, Ponton, from the series Mobile, 2000-2009 (work in progress)

© Loan Nguyen, Lac de Joux, from the series Mobile, 2000-2009 (work in progress)

“In the morning mist, the barely visible figure of a woman. As if on a tight rope, she walks along the edges of a stone pool, one step at a time. Close by, the same figure appears, creating a hand shadow on the wall of a rough concrete building, or contemplating its reflection in the calm waters of a lake…Recollections of childhood games, moments when one discovers in bewilderment that we are actually part of this world. Human presence discretely seeps into the landscapes, softly slides in. A posture, a slight gesture… and a link is established. A shadow is cast, an object is picked up, a reflection is seen : the effect of a being on his surroundings always remains slight. The body may then make its imprint by proxy, by mere projection. Points of contact appear, bonds are woven, and these minimalist spaces become territories of introspection (…)”

Raphaëlle Stopin

To see more of Loan’s work click here

║ Léa Crespi ║

© Léa Crespi, Untitled, from the series Lieux, 2008

© Léa Crespi, Untitled, from the series Lieux, 2008

© Léa Crespi, Untitled, from the series Lieux, 2008

“L’espace est toujours marqué par le temps. Un temps qui l’a dégradé ou, pour le moins, transformé. Mais cet espace, auquel nous n’aurions pas dû avoir accès, s’impose à nous, avec ses peintures écaillées, ses blessures de fils électriques abandonnés, ses minuscules désastres du quotidien parce qu’un corps le traverse, sans l’habiter.
Corps magnifique, sculptural, qui nous oblige à regarder, voir peut-être, l’espace dans lequel il évolue sans se l’approprier tant il est, toujours, à la limite de l’effacement, de la disparition. Comme une évidente présence qui nous dirait, déjà, que tout est fini. Un corps surgi de l’espace qui semble l’avoir généré et que nous ne pourrons apprivoiser.
Il y a de la séduction dans ce travail, de la séduction comme leurre. De la séduction parce qu’il peut sidérer. Et ce n’est pas le propos. Séduire pour mieux tromper, montrer pour mieux s’évader…
La modalité de l’exposition s’inscrit dans la logique du travail : il ne s’agit pas d’une exposition, ni d’une installation, mais d’une mise en espace d’années de travail qui se concrétisent dans un lieu.
Images “en l’air”, son qui les accompagne ou les caresse, juste une idée de l’importance du mot, trop lié aux images et aujourd’hui galvaudé, d’environnement.
Regardez, vous êtes dans un espace. Vous êtes qui ? Juste une branche ? Faut regarder aux environs…”

Christian Caujolle

To see more of Léa’s work click here

║ Marianne Engel ║

© Marianne Engel, Lunar Eclipse, 2008

© Marianne Engel, W, 2005

© Marianne Engel, V Room, 2004

“Like a hunter, Marianne Engel usually takes her pictures at night when it is quiet and still outside. Nature and seemingly deserted houses are of her favourite subject matter. In her images, Marianne Engel captures a mood that is normally hidden from us, offering a transitory glimpse into another reality. Marianne Engel only uses scarce light sources such as an occasional flashlight or the light of the moon and the stars. This unassuming and low-tech approach to photography gives Marianne Engel´s work its casual beauty. Caused by the long exposure time, Engel´s mysterious interpretations of nature and architecture are very crisp images whose colours she occasionally enhances in her studio. “I instinctively discover these images on my night walks. They reflect my personal reality. It is as if I find something that has been lost and hidden in my unconsciousness.”

source: Rotwand gallery

To see more of Marianne’s work click here

║ Teresa Chen ║

© Teresa Chen, Projections #6, from the series Projections, 2007

© Teresa Chen, Gorgeous #3, from the series Gorgeous, 2004

To see more of Teresa’s work click here

║ Jules Spinatsch ║

© Jules Spinatsch, Unit PAMM, 2005

© Jules Spinatsch, Unit HS, 2004

“Depuis des années, Jules Spinatsch (*1966 à Davos) observe cette pollution de logos et de publicité rampante dans les sports d’hiver. L’exploitation commerciale et écologique des Alpes est au centre de ses préoccupations. Son travail photographique met en évidence l’absence de geste ou de fait non intéressé dans le sport, sans arrière-pensée commerciale. Quand le théoricien Jordi Vidal (1) parle au sujet du footballeur Zidane filmé par Douglas Gordon et Philippe Pareno (2) d’un “logo actif”, d’un “porteur de marchandise”, Jules Spinatsch nous montre “le devenir logo des Alpes”, de leurs habitants et de leurs visiteurs. La spectacularisation des compétitions sportives entraîne l’exploitation visuelle de toutes les surfaces possibles.
Qu’une pente enneigée soit exploitée par une projection lumineuse pour un son et lumière faisant apparaître des figures aussi aberrantes que celle d’une frégate de flibustier du XVIIIème siècle en plein milieu alpin n’a pas les mêmes conséquences que l’exploitation des pentes enneigées par l’industrie intensive du ski, mais l’un est indissociable de l’autre dans la chaîne commerciale des sports d’hiver. Pour cette véritable industrie du “temps libre”, on fabrique de la neige artificielle à longueur de journée (et de nuit) – et ceci d’autant plus que la moyenne des températures ne cesse d’augmenter – et l’on prépare des dizaines de kilomètres de pistes de ski avec des divisions entières de “PistenBully” et de “Ratrac” ayant comme ultime conséquence la ruine de l’équilibre écologique. Si l’ensemble de sa série intitulée “Snowmanagement” souligne ainsi l’exploitation commerciale de ce que les citadins arrivent encore à nommer “nature alpine”, le titre de l’exposition, “Eiszeit IV (époque glaciaire)”, tire clairement l’attention sur une régression, autant civilisatrice que climatique.”

Jordi Vidal, Servitude et simulacre, éditions Allia, Paris, 2007

To see more of Jules’ work click here

║Yann Gross ║

© Yann Gross, from the series Horizonville, 2005

© Yann Gross, from the series Horizonville, 2005

© Yann Gross, from the series Horizonville, 2005

“The Valais is one of the most touristic places in Switzerland. Its mountains are the icons of this country. To reach those idyllic places, it is necessary to drive through the Rhône plain.
However, only a few people knows what the plain looks like and what is going on there. A highway is passing through the valley, so nobody stops there before arriving to the famous ski resorts.
The industrial landscape, which is characteristic of the valley, isn’t attractive at all, at least at first sight. Nevertheless, most of the inhabitants are living there.
Since i hadn’t a lot of money and wanted to travel, i decided to make a road trip by motorbike for three month is this valley (which is located 50km far from my home), looking for an exotic lifestyle, something else than the picutres i knew from my country (i was inspired by David Lynch’s movie «a straight story»).
By the means of a trip by motorbike in the Rhône Valley, the pictures are about the American dream. The myth we know through the medias and the movies. Most of the people I photographed haven’t ever been in the United State of America. They feel a sense of belonging to another culture that they don’t really know. Far from the Swiss stereotypes, the confusion of symbols and the lifestyle of the people take us in a strange atmosphere, a dreamed reality that doesn’t exist in facts.”
Yann Gross

To see more of Yann’s work click here

║Yann Mingard ║

© Yann Mingard, from the series The Road Less Travelled, 2005

© Yann Mingard, from the series The Road Less Travelled, 2005

© Yann Mingard, from the series The Road Less Travelled, 2005

“In 1935, two intrepid Europeans undertook what seemed an impossible journey. Ella Maillart, a Swiss Olympic sailor, and Peter Fleming, an Englishman and correspondent for The Times, set off from Peking to Kashmir, a route which had not been travelled for eight years. They were advised that their greatest chance of success was to plot a course through Western China which was so difficult that the authorities had not thought to forbid it. Seventy years on, Swiss photographer Yann Mingard and writer Bruno Paulet set out to follow in their footsteps, recreating the most testing and memorable part of the journey through Eastern Turkestan. In the Teijinar oasis, they struggled to persuade the sceptical locals of the seriousness of their endeavour. After two weeks of tortuous negotiation, their modest caravan was ready: a horse, two camels, and Mangke, the village drunk, who accepted in a moment of madness the role of their guide.”

More of Yann’s work can be seen here