Galerie David Guiraud is showing Jan Saudek through 20 December 2025. Born in 1935 in Prague, Saudek is a Czech photographer whose work lies at the crossroads of photography and painting.
Most of his original prints are made in black and white, but they never remain purely photographic. After processing, Saudek paints and retouches each print by hand, adding colors, nuances and textures to create an effect close to painting or collage. Each print thus becomes a unique work, the result of a creative process in which photography and painting are intimately intertwined.
The images shown in this exhibition date from the 1980s, a period regarded as one of the artist’s richest and most creative. It was during this time that Saudek consolidated his style, combining theatrical staging, pictorial composition and symbolic intensity, and fully developed his unique visual language.
Saudek’s central themes (love, the body, the family, the passage of time, human fragility and memory) run through all of his work. Nudity, which is often present, does not have an erotic function; it is above all a way of bringing out the vulnerability, innocence or intimacy of the figures and of underlining the universal and timeless nature of human emotions. The touches of color painted by hand onto the prints reinforce the symbolic and theatrical dimension of each composition, turning each image into a vivid, expressive tableau.
The exhibition presents a selection of around thirty original prints, all signed by the artist, which make it possible to appreciate the richness of his approach. Each work is unique, testifying to the singular nature of Jan Saudek’s practice and his ability to transform photography into a pictorial medium that is original, emotional and timeless.
Jan Saudek : Tirages d’époque des années 80
Until 20 December 2025
Galerie David Guiraud
5, rue du Perche
75003 Paris – 01 42 71 78 62
http://www.galerie-david-guiraud.com
Tuesday / Saturday – 14:30 / 19:00
