Elsa Parra (1990) and Johanna Benaïnous (1991) have formed the artist duo Elsa & Johanna since 2014. Since their meeting, they have developed a body of work at the intersection of photography, performance, and video. They construct visual narratives in which they portray themselves, aptly embodying a multitude of characters, regardless of age, gender, or social status. Their work is part of a dual heritage: that of the tradition of photographic portraiture and that of a new image culture, shaped by cinema, advertising, and social media.
Lost & Found is an original creation conceived as a journey through more than ten years of artistic collaboration. Through a selection of works from different series, this exhibition weaves a narrative thread where the images echo one another and reveal recurring themes in their work: the interplay of identity and transformation, the construction of gender, the strangeness of everyday life, the blurred line between real and imaginary, solitude, the poetry of domestic and natural spaces, visual memory, and the influence of cinematic language.
Staging is at the heart of their approach: staging the self, but also staging the exhibition space. For Lost & Found, Elsa & Johanna have created an immersive scenography, entirely conceived as an extension of their visual universe. The space, tinged with retro-futurism, becomes a setting in its own right, in which their series interact in a fictional temporality.
In this play of illusions, the off-screen becomes an active territory: what is not shown is as important as what is shown. Elsa & Johanna’s images suggest more than they assert, allowing the viewer the freedom to project their own narratives, somewhere between constructed reality, assumed fiction, and dreamlike resonances.
This exhibition is also an opportunity for the duo to unveil for the first time previously unseen photographs from their latest series, continuing their exploration of narrative through images and metamorphosis.
Elsa & Johanna : Lost & Found
Centre photographique Marseille
June 7 – September 27
