Posters, Postcards and Tourist Untitled (Flam-Up), 2019 (Extract)
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Hélène Bellenger Portfolio 17 place jean Jaurès 13005 Marseille (france) Tel: 06.48.89.48.28 email: [email protected] WEB: www.helenebellenger.com Instagram: helene.bellenger Hélène Bellenger collects and reappropriates images taken from her spatial, temporal and digital contemporaneity, in order to question and overturn their meaning. Through this work of confiscation and re-use of images, the artist digs into her visual culture and thus deconstructs the intermediary, political and cultural space of the “re” in representation. Born in 1989, Hélène Bellenger lives and works in Marseille. After a double degree in law and art history, she specialized in photography and contemporary art at the Sorbonne University. She graduated from the French National School of Photography in Arles in 2016. Immediately after her degree, her installations BIOGRAPHY were exhibited at Agnès B. gallery in Paris, curated by Alexandre Quoi and Aurélie Pétrel. In 2017, she exhibited & at the 62nd Salon de Montrouge, at the Salon Variation - Artjaws Media Art Fair and at the Binôme gallery in Paris. In December 2017, she was invited by the French Institute STATEMENT to present her first solo show at the Soma gallery in Cairo (Egypt). Laureate of the Dior Photography Prize for Young Talents for the ENSP, with her project Right Color, she exhibited at the Luma Foundation during the Rencontres d’Arles festival 2018, as well as the Circulation (s) Festival, at 104 in Paris. After a residency in Corsica, as part of the Ateliers Médicis (2019), she received the Nopoto research and creat grant. She took part in a residency program in a high altitude shelter, l’Envers des pentes. In December 2019, the Fonderia 20.9 gallery in Verona (Italy) inaugurated the artist’s third solo show. In 2020, Hélène Bellenger was chosen as one of the finalists for the 9th edition of Talents Contemporains, organized by the François Schneider Foundation Bluewashing, 2019 - 2020 Untitled (postcard flip side), 2019. Collage 10 x 08 cm from the collection of postcards from the 19th and 20th centuries, departmental archives of Haute and Basse, Bastia and Ajaccio (Corsica). Work-in-progress with Ateliers Médicis & Création en Cours 2019 Everyone has already noticed the phenomenon of color photos that have been exposed to the sun for too long and end up displaying “washed-out blue” hues. The same phenomenon can be observed in images of magazines left outside or advertisements left too long in their panels: the images become entirely blue, more or less intense. What is this phenomenon that makes colors fade in the sun? And why does blue thus become the dominant color in the image? In a kind of reversal of the flow of tourist images, this phenomenon, also called “photoaging”, appears to give us a behind the scenes glimpse of this “blue escape” used excessively on posters, postcards and tourist Untitled (Flam-up), 2019 (extract). Image of a matchbox, blued by the sun overdraft. advertisements. La Coulure, 2019 - 2020 La coulure - exhibition kit, 2019. Inkjet prints on 31 x 31 cm white box. 56 cyanotype 30 x 30 cm on 250gr Canson paper. Finalist of the 9th edition of Contemporary Talents with the François Schneider Foundation and winner of the NOPOTO research and creation grant. How can we question landscape representations in an era characterized by environmental crisis and the deconstruction of the concept of nature? Is it possible to redefine the role of the photographer in a society which is already saturated with images? These are the questions that guided the project Prussian flow. Hélène Bellenger used the cyanotype technique to document the rapid melting of the La Selle glacier in France. Small pieces of ice, taken directly from the glacier of the Ecrins National Park were placed on papers, these having previously been brushed with cyanotype. The ice melts in the sun and thus slowly activates the photosensitive mixture. For a week, Hélène Bellenger renewed this operation, repetitive and meticulous, transforming the glacier into a kind of “art studio”. Flows of Prussian blue form as the ice melts and water reacts with the cyanotype. Thus, as the pieces of ice are soaked with their own melted water, the setup serves as an illustration of the rapid and worrying melting of the La Selle glacier. Furthermore, the process prints permanent images on the cyanotype paper. This ‘behind the scenes’ approach of endangered spaces that are so often depicted in ‘postcard’ beauty is also an homage to the photographic Untitled imbibition), 2019 (extract). Ice, cyanotype, Canson paper 250 gr. expeditions of the 19th century. Untitled (Bogèves), 2020. Untitled (dripping 1 & 2), 2019. Ice, cyanotype, canson paper 250gr. Brainbow, 2019 Brainbow, 2019. Print on 650gr mat non-woven wallpaper, 450 x 278 cm and enhanced mat paper inkjet print 30 x 40 cm in gray metal frame. Installation in situ. Exhibition view, Science Porn, peristyle of the city hall of Tours 2020. Exhibition in partnership with the National Institute of Health and Medical Research and the National School of Photography. Project developed in partnership with the National Institute for Medical Research (INSERM) and the National School of Photography (ENSP) The aesthetic paradigm of so-called “scientific images” comes under the regime of “objectivity”. This word, the meaning of which changed profoundly from the 17th century until today, only appeared in the mid-19th century as a new way of studying nature and a scientific objective The concept of “false color” is used in technical imagery (astronomical, satellite imagery, medical imagery, or mining prospection), in order to highlight minor variations of a gray. The Image J software allows the user to colorize an MRI by applying different color tables depending on what one wants to highlight. One of the color tables is called Warhol. I decided to “warholize” an MRI by applying, to a given image, all the color charts that the software offers. Brainbow, 2019 (excerpt). Printing on wallpaper 278 x 450 cm and inkjet printing enhanced mat This process of digital reappropriation allows us to overturn the concept of “false color”, common in scientific paper 30 x 40 cm in gray metal frame. Exhibition view, Science Porn, gallery of the new premises of vocabulary and often unknown to the general public. Via the vocabulary of pop culture, this installation questions the National School of Photography (ENSP), Arles 2019. the “disneylandisation” of scientific images in the media. Untitled (atlas), 2019 Untitled (atlas), 2019 - 2020. Prints in double elephant format (50 x 70cm). Duplex lazer printing, black and white, mat, 220gr paper. Spirals in metals. Exhibition view, Science Porn, peristyle of the city hall of Tours. Exhibition in partnership with the National Institute of Health and Medical Research and the National School of Photography. Project developed in partnership with the National Institute for Medical Research (INSERM) and the National School of Photography (ENSP) Contemporary scientific images and images from scientific archives confront each other, separated by the metal spirals Untitled (atlas), 2019 - 2020. Prints in double elephant format (50 x 70cm). Duplex lazer printing, afixed to the supporting structure. From a contemporary tractography to an archive image from a Japanese anatomy black and white, mat, 220gr paper. Spirals in metals. Exhibition view, Science Porn, peristyle of the atlas of 1742, these images presented as diptychs take on a new meaning and question us about fiction, unrealism and city hall of Tours. Exhibition in partnership with the National Institute of Health and Medical aesthetics in the scientific visual culture. Research and the National School of Photography Science Porn, 2019 #scienceporn, 2019 (extraits). Project developed in partnership with the National Institute for Medical Research (INSERM) and the National School of Photography (ENSP) #scienceporn, 2019. Inkjet print on duratrans paper, 6 x 1600 cm. White light table, 500 x 15 cm. Images collected on the Instagram social network with the # scienceporn between April 11 and 12, 2019. Scientific images Exhibition view Science Porn, peristyle of the city hall of Tours, France. and fiction images mix in a great flow of pop colors. Right color, 2018. Print on opaque advertising tarpaulin, 170 x 133 cm. Posters A3 format (29.7 x 49 cm), printed on 90 gr glossy paper. Exhibition view, La Fotogenica, Fonderia 20.9 gallery, Verona, Italy 2019. Right Color, 2018 Right Color, 2018 (excerpt). Make-up recipes presented on A5 size notepad. Exhibition view, Les Corps Dociles, Quai des Arts de Cugnaux, 2018. Project laureate of the Dior Prize for Photography for Young Talents for the ENSP 2018. Developed within the collections of the Cinémathèque de Toulouse, as part of the 1 + 2 Factory Residency. Image technology from the 1920s-1950s had a sparse, monochrome color spectrum. To highlight the contrasts and the expressiveness of faces, the makeup was accentuated to the point of being grotesque (royal blue on eyelids and lips, a touch of sulfur yellow on the nose, cheekbones powdered in green). By collecting articles dealing with make-up for television and cinema in Cinémonde magazines from the 1920s and 1950s, Hélène Bellenger brrings to light makeup that Right color, 2018. Print on opaque advertising tarpaulin, 170 x 133 cm. was invisible to the screens of the XXth century. The portraits we observe thus take on a clownish disturbing quality, and Exhibition view, La Fotogenica, Fonderia 20.9 gallery, Verona, Italy 2019. question us about the construction of the imagery of beauty. Right color, 2018. Print on opaque advertising tarpaulin, 170 x 133 cm. Make-up recipes presented on A5 size notepad. Exhibition view, La Fotogenica, Fonderia 20.9 gallery, Verona, Italy 2019. Les corps dociles, 2018 Untitled (tapestries), 2018 (extract). Seven strips of tapestry 250 gr, 550 x 65 cm.