In 2013, Tono Mejuto, a young photographer from Madrid, charmed the Planche(s) Contact Jury with a piece entitled “Le jamais vu de Deauville”. Blurred crowds, such as those in paparazzi images, form a compact mass from which emerge discreet medallion-like portraits, small, clear-cut areas – the nape of women’s neck, half a face, a bra strap across a back – that pin down a contemporary reality of the town.
As for Camille Picquot, her work is a celebration of the incongruous, the fugitive, the unforeseen: a man seems wrapped in an amorous embrace by his car; individuals are caught in enigmatic confrontation with an accident – such as a falling pile of packing blocks…
It was impossible for the Jury to choose one over the other and both photographers were declared winners of the Planche(s) Contact Fondation Louis Roederer Student Competition in 2013.
Domestic Flight – Camille Picquot
A narrative proceeds from the images. Let us look into the intimacy of the banal, witness a series of unknown actions led in an ordinary context, an inventory of ritual and concealed phenomena, or again a clinical space made of softness and solitude. Each occurrence has its impossible counterpart. These apparently objective facts raise questions. Banality ceases to be so when deployed, and imagination expands when less is offered to the gaze. Here, traces of nature peacefully blend with the industrial effects, as inside and outside offer a private setting. Austerity slips into shapes, not into sensations, since it is about starkness, as well as matter. From one stage to the next, textures echo one another, confusing circumstances. Vision acts upon the skin. Each component aspires to rekindle a known sensation. The image, as cold as it may be, attracts touch. Banality has come out of itself: leaving us searching for the circumstances of this overflow.
Stars & Stripes – Tono Mejuto
I come back to Deauville during the 40th edition of the American Film Festival, where celebrities gather on the occasion of the latest releases. More or less successfully I try to capture some of those moments of brilliance. Stars & Stripes is a brief essay about the impossibility
of seeing.
FESTIVAL
Planche(s) Contact 2014
Camille Picquot – Domestic Flight
Tono Mejuto – Stars & Stripes
From October 25th to November 30th, 2014
Chapelle des Franciscaines
Avenue de la République
14800 Deauville
France
