A photographic journey
Isabelle Derigo and Thomas Dorn met several years ago on a photography project that involved the notion of interplay and the fluctuation between internal identity and external representation. This meeting led to many sessions spread over a five years period, during which they produced a collection made of several series of pictures that illustrate this journey.
Isabelle Derigo from Geneva and Thomas Dorn from Germany are different in many regards. Isabelle is focused and straightforward, perpetually reflecting on how to construct and express her inner self. Her modus operandi is the awareness of the movements— of her body, her mind and her art.
Thomas is a lanky, sharp-sighed photographer with a frank smile and an infectious kindness. He is used to capturing that singular moment when humanity reveals itself on a face, a landscape or a situation. Isabelle practices and teaches yoga, and has painted for many years; Thomas is a photographer who has published several books.
The convergence of these two worlds, which they have nurtured and allowed to mature despite the distance that often separates them, gave birth to this photographic journey they called The Yoke, the link.
Nude, Light and the Union of opposites
The guiding principle behind their photography is that the world is made of opposites, of complementary elements that confront and feed off one another: interior/exterior, individual/community, light/darkness, intimacy/public expression… To illustrate this , they chose to use the naked human body, unclothed, stripped of any brand, void of any identity other than the one created in every shot.
The formal unity of the project is inspired by the traditional yoga postures that are present in every series, and which express with gentleness, sensuality and humor this poetic interplay of opposites. Far from a rigid expression of a millennial practice, this approach uses the body—a material favored by artists for centuries—like clay, veritable living matter kneaded to suit the meanderings of their imagination and the meaning they wish to lend to their pictures, as well as the light and settings they went and discovered, those hidden landscapes from India to the Nevada desert.
The Yoke, when the inside is outside
Over the course of myriad photo shoots, discussions and years, the work developed into five progressive series on the themes of the Body, Nature, Love, the idea of Culture, and Creativity… like a series of snapshots describing the stages of our different states of being.
Intimate, black and white tight-shot pictures, where the body reveals all nuances in grey tones, like an entity apart from the world, contrast with color images where the body dissolves into the magnificence and beauty of Nature, like a tiny particle of a huge Oneness.
Another series in black and white depicts two partners, two different bodies, separate and yet intimately connected… Yet “The Yoke, the link” is also the light shone on the present moment, as in another series that counters formalism with humor and irony by diverting the aesthetics and discourse Pop Art and publicity campaigns, or by harnessing the creative and unconventional eloquence of the participants at the Burning Man Festival…
These years of collaboration have produced a rich work, which, far from limiting itself to the two dimensions of photography, has become a medium and an invitation to contemplate beauty and reflect on the different identities of our body and mind, and on our relation to others whether they be mineral, vegetable, animal or human… Isabelle and Thomas pursue their search and are preparing a book hat tells the story of this wonderful adventure in pictures and words.
Isabelle Derigo and Thomas Dorn: The Yoke Series
Exposition des séries 1 et 2
From march 31st to May 3rd, 2013
Galerie B
26 rue du Général de Gaulle
29930 Pont Aven
France
