Finalists 2022, Florence Chevallier

“Florence Chevallier has used photography for more than 40 years to question the imperceptible, an approach at the interface of an existential quest and a cathartic need.”

Florence Chevallier has used photography for more than 40 years to question the imperceptible, an approach at the interface of an existential quest and a cathartic need. Series after series, decade after decade, this visual artist continues to use innovative expression, switching from black and white to colour, from film – slide, negative – to digital, arranging her photographs alone, in diptychs or collages, etc.

This diversity can be seen in the genres she tackles – portrait, landscapes and still life – and in her processing, from figurative to abstract. Her first works – series of self-portraits – are much more than representations of her face and body.

Through Florence Chevallier, we are contemplating ourselves because the themes underlying her images are metaphysical, for example, her series La mort/Death (1989) and Le Bonheur/Happiness (1993). And more broadly, the artist addresses human beings, life, relationships with others, sexuality…

Even when she stops presenting herself, Florence Chevallier continues to explore her inner self, pursuing a universal vein. Each series – varying in volume – is a pretext for representing feelings and emotions of which she expresses all the nuances, from the most pleasant to the most painful, even to the most uncomfortable.

The titles of her series speak for themselves: Enchantements/Enchantments (1996-1998), Les Plaisirs/Pleasures (2016-2018), Éblouissement/Amazement (2020). Life experience is always at the heart of her work.

Sophie Bernard

Show Biography

Born in Casablanca, Morocco, in 1955.

Florence Chevallier graduated from the Institut d’Études Théâtrales of the Université Paris 3 in 1978. Her work began to gain recognition in 1981 thanks to the exhibition Self-Portraits at the Centre Pompidou in Paris.

She created the group ‘Noir Limite’ in 1985 with Yves Tremorin and Jean-Claude Bélégou. Intensified by the black of the photographic image and the light, the human body, both feminine and masculine, is embodied in the figures of Eros and Thanatos.

The exhibition in 1987 of the series of images entitled Corps à corps, in which she depicts the sexual act and the most intimate parts of her body, provoked indignation and then censorship at the Maison de la Culture in Bourges.

In 1993 the photographer continued to feature herself in Le Bonheur. The light is always treated in a specific way, as an integral part of the colour images presenting emblematic scenes of the life of a couple. Her work always evolves towards the search for the self, a questioning of existence. She eventually removes herself from it physically, but, paradoxically, her personal involvement is even more intense.

In 2000, she travelled to her native land: Casablanca 1955, shows places that are sometimes devoid of any human presence, but full of a life that we can imagine. Florence Chevallier was awarded the Niépce Prize in 1998 and received a Villa Médicis grant in 2009. Her work now extends to video. She is currently a professor at the École Nationale Supérieure de Bourges.

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SITE :
https://www.florencechevallier.org