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born in 1972 (F). |
Franck Bernhard
"Regard étranger" - 2009
Par le biais de la photographie, Franck Bernhard nous raconte une histoire, ou plutôt un point de vue sur l’histoire d’un quartier à un moment donné. Dans ce nouveau travail sur la ville de Rome, les photographies reflètent l’ambiance particulière d’une place célèbre: la “Piazza di Spagna”. Située en plein coeur de Rome, entre deux rues commerçantes, cette place est un lieu de rencontre entre touristes, autochtones, et consommateurs divers.
Au pied de ce lieu de rencontre, se trouve un mur gris neutre cachant une façade en construction. Ce mur servira de fond à chacune des images. Dans ce nouveau travail intitulé “Regard Etranger”, des personnages se croisent, laissant croire à des rencontres hasardeuses. La simplicité de ces images dirige notre regard vers des personnages isolés. Les gens sont pris à leur insu, de manière systématique et très spontanée. Le fond gris neutre nous renvoie aux images prises sur le site du Cap Blanc-Nez. En effet dans le travail précédent intitulé “Passages”, les sujets se croisent devant un ciel bleu uniforme qui ouvre l’espace vers un horizon infini. Ici dans “Regard étranger”, les personnages se détachent de leur contexte, et le regard nous ramène à un seul et même plan, qui ferme l’espace et nous donne à voir des portraits insolites. “Le scénario est entre les mains de mes protagonistes. On peut observer leurs agissements, leur comportement, ou même leur absence d’expression”. Certaines images laissent apparaître parfois quelques détails: une paire de lunettes, des bijoux... Autant de détails qui nous renvoient à l’identité de chacun des passants.
Ces artifices se traduisent par une certaine recherche d’identité, voir même une dévotion à un culte de la personnalité. Nous sommes ici loin de la photographie de mode, des éclairages de studio et de la photographie commerciale. Et si les sujets semblent fort soucieux de leur apparence, c’est peut-être parce qu’ils sont tout simplement le reflet de la société de consommation.
"Passages" - 2001-2003
The “ Cap-Blanc-Nez ” spot, well-known for its panoramic view upon the “Opal” Coast makes up, together with the “Cap -Gris-Nez” spot, one of the famous touristic meeting place in the “Nord – Pas de Calais” region of France. Individuals from different nationalities gather there alone, with family or in groups.
Located near Belgium, England and the Netherlands, it represents through its ease of access and its touristical appeal, a nice spot to capture changing and varied life scenes. But further away from a simple perimeter, temporarily inhabited by moving figures and anonymous characters it reflects both the idea of some metaphysical – nearly ontological – individual quest, the dualism between individuals and groups, and anyone’s confrontation with himself.
Unlike urban spaces, here the landscape is minimalist and throws strollers back to a confrontation between themselves and to one fixed line: the horizon.
Dissidents from the stroll tend towards this horizon, a powerful infinity symbol. Infinity they can’t, by definition, reach. The cliff’s very existence recalls the limits of a such impossible quest towards infinity. The horizontal line enables the image’s construction and partition between the solid element – the cliff’s ground – and the aerial element – the sky. This partition refers in some ways to religious buildings’ symbolic: the search for up-lifting. First physical elevation: the cliff allows the domination over all the space underneath. Next spiritual elevation: individuals give the impression they’ve gathered in order to participate to something. The spot becomes a pilgrimage symbol without being religious. It seems to deal with pagan devotion. Blues and whites – Virgin Mary’s colour – reinforces this religious feeling. Individuals, lost between earth and sky, come to light as coloured dashes accentuating some large blue area.
This space is a continuum. Empty from any building, any ornament, is becomes a perimeter propitious to characters’ repetition and variation. It’s always possible to switch continuously from one individual to another thanks to the static aspect. This work is some intermediary object between photography, animated images and fiction.
The determined perimeter is a clutch lever generating behaviours for both individuals and groups. There exists some equality between people in front of this lever. They are all at the same level. No visible criteria can uncover a social distinction, apart from clothes maybe. The rest is suggested. This space represents a lever to the imaginary. The individual is there to participate to something. One isn’t in Friedrich’s romantic space anymore, where the individual’s back became the essence of romantic experience inside nature.
Here man is confronted only to himself. He only exists through someone else’s glance. Through their closeness, their remoteness, their posture… one guesses from a simple confrontation between people in a given space, these photographs are the archetype of our social and emotional lives. The witness is asked transcendental questions, most of which will stay unanswered:
Who are we? Where are we coming from? What are we doing? Where are we going?