The Carré d’Art is a photographic gallery based in Chartres de Bretagne, near Rennes. Until 21st May, the gallery is showing “Les enfants fichus”, a series of photographs by Coralie Salaün. This work was started three years ago and finished during a residency at the Carré d’Art since November 2015.
The idea of making “Les enfants fichus” in the form of an ABC-book came after reading the book The Gashlycrumb Tinies by the American illustrator Edward Gorey (1925-2000). In the manner of Gorey’s approach, Coralie Salaün created and ABC-book with 26 first names, each having a predetermined characteristic, sometimes mythical: Azazel, Cassandra, Judas, Harmony, Orpheus, Prudence, Ulysses, Victor… which is attributed to each child.
She attaches a small narrative sentence, in rhyme, to each forename: Azazel separate from his own wings, Eve mown down in a dream, Judas made like a rat, Orpheus blown away in smoke, Victor crushed in the black night…
Then she made a photograph of each child, with careful staging, first going through a storyboard stage.
During the photographic staging, the children were put into the light in a dignified posture, stiff, they were motionless and clearly “in danger”, about to be overwhelmed by imminent tragedy.
In this terrifying nocturnal universe, Coralie Salaün wanted to capture the vision of the child, its vulnerability, its isolation, and to look from its point of view by placing herself at its height.
The night reinforces this impression of tension and danger but also the feverish state of the child.
The props and scenery used here ( spiders, snakes, rats, barbed wire, trains, shadows fog, ghosts…) become a materialisation of adults, and more specifically in this case, parents.
EXHIBITION
Les enfants fichus
Coralie Salaün
Galerie Le Carré d’Art – Centre Culturel Pôle Sud
1 rue de la Conterie – BP 37604
35176 Chartres de Bretagne cedex
France
[email protected]
http://www.galerielecarredart.fr
http://coraliesalaun.fr/series/les-enfants-fichus/
