In the tradition of the collective Tendance Floue, there are often questions about meeting, debate, action, collective implementation, control, exhibition, publication and, every time, celebration. Their 25th anniversary, which they are opening with the exhibition Tendance Floue : Twenty five? Hey, give me five! And which will continue throughout 2016, is one of these golden occasion giving them the opportunity to invite their public to share new proposals under the auspices of a photographic maturity as much of the collective as of each artist who comprises it.
Tendance Floue, founded in 1991 by Caty Jan, Denis Bourges, Mat Jacob, Patrick Tournebœuf, Thierry Ardouin, who would be quickly joined by Gilles Coulon, Meyer, Olivier Culmann, Pascal Aimar, Philippe Lopparelli, is a confraternity that has almost developed into siblings. Once enthroned in “Tendance” you stay welded together for the worst as well as the best: the success as much as the difficult times, the rant as much as the laughter, the glorious years as much as those of the budgetary meltdowns which have battered photography in recent years. Tendance Floue also knows incredibly well how to work together on the big teamwork projects such as the Mad in…[1], cartes blanches made to the four corners of the world according to their inspirations, Tendance Floue, not having an oligarchic structure, gives, at the same time, complete freedom to each artist to develop personal projects, to all of which is brought friendly support but also the necessary critical observation.
Over the course of time, the founders have welcomed other authors coming from other horizons such as Flore-Aël Surun, Bertrand Meunier, and Alain Willaume. At the start of the collective, the practice of reporting was strongly politically identified. It has brought together very diverse approachs, so much and so well that the professional world tended to qualify them as authors to refer to these atypical photographers delivering engaged messages thru their visual writing. Together with this intellectual and political foundation, it is important to point out the stylistic evolution of each member of Tendance Floue along these twenty-five years.
For the inaugural exhibition of 25 years of Tendance Floue to which the Topographie de l’Art space gives the possibility of a large-scale display, it is impossible to put to one side the historic icons that are now part of its heritage. They are as much political and artistic symbols that mark out its course. They show in the exhibitions and publications their excellence and their diversity as much as the standards and banners of the commitment of the collective. And, beyond the recent works or those in progress, there are those not yet published or exhibited that will enrich the visual possibility with so much that was unexpected.
Tendance Floue is as much a collective as the sum of thirteen artistic individualities and it is therefore with this logic that the members decided to pursue the bringing forward of their personal progress. This had already been the intention, in the course of 2011.
Christine Ollier
co-curator of the exhibition “Twenty five? Hey, give me five!”
[1]The Mad in : China 2007, India 2008, France 2009, Sète 2011, Korea (release in 2016).
EXHIBITION
Tendance Floue : Twenty five? Hey, give me five!
Curators : Christine Ollier, Fany Dupechez, Mat Jacob
From September 5th to October 17th, 2015
Espace Topographie de l’Art
15 rue de Thorigny
75003 Paris
France
From Tuesday to Saturday 14h – 19h
T. 01 40 29 44 28
M° : St Paul ou St Sébastien-Froissart
http://www.topographiedelart.fr
http://www.tendancefloue.net
