「 Éric PETR, born in the 60s, worked in the 80s, and later, in the early 2000s, on the image set in motion with an artistic intention using a camera.
This technique was named several years later “Intentional Camera Movement”, taken up by the hashtags #icm or #icmphotography and is today widely taken up by many talented young photographers.
Following the dynamics of several photographers and visual artists who preceded him, such as Kōtarō Tanaka (1905-1995), Ernst Haas (1921-1986), and Alexey Titarenko (born in 1962) of his generation and a few other experimentalists, PETR in turn experimented with this artistic path mainly between 2003 and 2015. Unlike his peers, he made it the heart of his photographic work.
For about ten years, PETR has created a movement and a technique that allow him to serve his intention and his research work on light. This technique, which he calls [Insitu Kinetic Photography], is the basis of his work, and has allowed him to set up many works that he has experimented with, particularly in abstract photography or subjective abstraction photography.
PETR began his career as a professional photographer in 2013 after 20 years of photographic research. After having caught the attention of some contemporary art players, between 2011 and 2014 where he assembled a synthesis of his work on light on his Blog and Instagram, he began in 2016 to be revealed in some prestigious magazines, such as L’OEIL DE LA PHOTOGRAPHIE, to be exhibited at the SALON DES RÉALITÉS NOUVELLES and to be published by Éditions CORRIDOR ÉLÉPHANT with his first monograph “SPIRITUELLES ODYSSÉES”. Since then, PETR has chained publications and exhibitions in Paris, and in the World. 」
“in situ kinetic photography” first principle of a manifesto
I started practicing photography in 1983, and for ten years I had this idea of developing a research and aesthetic based on light, and the impact that light can have on our mind, our thoughts, and our perception of the universe.
I resumed this work in 2003, after taking a break from photography between 1993 and 2003. Nevertheless, my reflection on the image nourished this period of inactivity, which subsequently proved very rich and constructive for my photographic work.
Ten years later, in 2003, after thinking long and hard about the image, its role and its power, I continued my photographic work on light, as plastic or matter, with a fresh eye.
“Bangkok 2oo4” and other works from the same period show a body of work that drew inspiration from this time of reflection, introspection and maturation.
In this new era of digital imaging, this style of photography was not yet precisely named, but a decade later it was, under the name ICM (Intentional Camera Movement).
In the 20th century, some photographers devoted part of their work to this technical aspect of motion photography, such as, to name but a few, Kōtarō Tanaka (1905-1995), Ernst Haas (1921-1986), and Alexey Titarenko (b. 1962), who worked specifically on moving crowds.
In the early 2000s, my work on the moving image, with the idea of painting with light on my film or sensor, is very contemporary in approach, and remains on the bangs.
My work, which is based on the principle of intentional movement, has now evolved to bring a broader field to the ICM, which I call “in situ kinetic photography”. “In situ kinetic photography” brings a wider field to the “intentional camera movement” and takes into account different axes and planes, in situ, for the same exposure that oscillates from a few seconds to a few minutes.
“In situ kinetic photography” is similar to the ultrasound of a place that is produced like a micro-film, but which is recorded on a single image. It is therefore neither multiple exposures nor post-processing work. Its photography is part of the field of abstraction, or subjective abstraction. Its writing is done with light and photons constitute its alphabet. Its language is cosmic, its style dreamlike and its aesthetic plastic. This photography is similar to painting in the sense that it is constructed on site by composing the elements that are added to the image.
The brush or pencil is the light ray that contains the matter and energy of electromagnetic waves, while the canvas or paper is the film or the camera sensor. Unlike the painter or the calligrapher, it is not the brush that moves, but the support, that is to say the camera. It is also, in this sense, that the intention of “in situ kinetic photography” is in no way that of “light painting”, even if we can observe certain common points.
For this photograph, composed in situ, elements very dispersed on the site are carefully chosen to compose a photographic painting. After an analysis of the times allowing the addition of the elements to be photographed, the photographer will have to determine precisely the speed of the shutter, the aperture of the focal length, and the sensitivity of the film, according to any filters added.
For “in situ kinetic photography”, the intention is no longer movement, as in “intentional camera movement”, but that of constructing an abstract image with a plastic density that will suggest the superposition of quantum states of a geographical point that light crosses during its infinite odyssey.
Variations of Light opus 5 [click on the image to enlarge it]
I’m delighted to announce my participation in the Réalités Nouvelles Hors les Murs exhibition in Shenyang, China!
§ – § – §
抽象融合 – ABSTRACT CONVERGENCE
学米支持 ACADEMIC SUPPORT 奥利维尔 -迪埃-皮齐奥 OLIVIER DI PIZIO 艺未总临 ARTISTIC DIRECTOR 徐比莉 EMILY XU
策展人：甄熙 COMMISSARIAT：ZHENXI
14.09 〜 17.11.2024
法国新现实协会 艺术家群展 EXHIBITION BY ARTIST COLLECTIVE RÉALITÉS NOUVELLES – PARIS
展覧地点｜SHOWROOM 沈阳市铁西区兴华北街8号 1905文化创意园1905艺术空间
Click on each image to enlarge
ABOUT MY ARTWORK
VARIATIONS DE LUMIÈRE OPUS 5 Photographic triptych 2021 (33x150cm) Copy #2/3 (+1 EA)
This opus is a continuation of a reflection on the essence of light and its effect on the perception of Being in its immediate or cosmic environment.
Light fascinates me by the duality of its state, at once corpuscular and wave-like, but also for everything that makes it our perception of the world.
My “Variations de Lumière” (Variations of Light), arranged by opus, are images born of my observation of light, revealing the gap in perception between photographed reality and the photographic record.
It is a metaphor, but I would say that the medium of photography is particularly well-suited to this study, because the photons that strike my negative, materialized by impact points on the emulsion layer of silver halide crystals, or on the low-pass filter of a sensor, describe the corpuscular nature of light during the shooting phase.
Similarly, this material, used as a material, underlines the wave-like nature of light, when these impacts on the negative become oscillations on the paper.
From this observation of photons recorded at a moment “T” in their infinite course through the cosmos, at a precise point in the universe, comes this writing of light.
These photographs, taken with a Nikon F3, mounted with a Nikkor 50mm f1.4 or 105mm f2.5 lens and Kodak film, bear witness to my highly creative period in the ’80s. They show, in successive order: the beach at Le Lavandou, the outside fire escape at the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, and a broken window in the former wasteland of Les Halles de la Villette in Paris.
The first silver photograph was a precursor to the work I’m still doing today. Taken at night, on the beach at Le Lavandou, with an exposure time of around 15 minutes, and shot at 720°, it recreates the electromagnetic atmosphere of a vacation and party spot, its beach, the black reflections of the sea and the rolling of the waves, the lights of boats, stars, the moon, coastal lighthouses and bars still barely lit.
A LONG-TERM COURSE… “who goes slowly, goes healthily”!
I took up photography in 1983, and spent ten passionate years with the idea of developing research and aesthetics based on “pure” light, and the impact it can have on our mind, our thoughts, or our perception of the universe.
The research I had begun on this subject was halted in 1993 by the upheaval caused by the arrival of digital technology in the world of photography.
It wasn’t until 10 years later, in 2003, after giving a great deal of thought to the image, its role and its power, that I took up this reflection and work again, using two media: digital and film photography.
In 2013, I opted to set up a company to develop this work over the long term.
Today, I exhibit and show my work in Paris, Europe and abroad.
Are you interested in following my work, discovering my new creations, and receiving invitations to my openings? You can register at this link: https: //www.ericpetr.net/contact/
I’m pleased to invite you to the opening of the “Propositions Abstraites” photography exhibition, Wednesday January 24, 6-9pm.
EXHIBITION January 25 to February 3, 2024 open Wednesday to Saturday, 2 to 7 p.m.
ABSTRACT PROJECT GALLERY 5 rue des Immeubles Industriels 75011 PARIS metro Nation www.abstract-project.com
#170
ABSTRACT PROPOSALS PHOTOGRAPHY For the second time, Abstract Project gallery presents an exhibition focusing on photography, its practices and its approach to non-figurative abstraction. The widespread availability and distribution of photographic possibilities has increased personal production tenfold, fostering experimentation and generating, in its continuous flow, abstract images from professionals, amateurs or simple opportunities to look. Avoiding an exhaustive panorama of this research, we wanted to invite artists close to the Réalités Nouvelles movement, whether photographers, painters or visual artists, to present their occasional or regular practice of abstraction in photography. By looking at the various media not in silos, but as tools that interact, feed off and support each other, the exhibition highlights how these artistic disciplines influence artists in their approach to abstract photography, and set them apart.
Exhibition initiated by Michel-Jean DUPIERRIS and Jun SATO with…
Caroline BOUCHER Florian BOUXIN Charlotte BRASSEAU Michel CARDOT Marcel CROZET Denise DEMARET-PRANVILLE Philippe Henri DOUCET Hippolyte DUPONT Elisabeth LAPLANTE Éric PETR Jun SATO Marie-Françoise SERRA Yoann YVONNET
Click on image to enlarge
Title: Hikari 0x308518BF Year: 2023 Copy: #1/3 Size: 19 x 19 cm [Cadre 32 x 32 cm] Technique: Digital photography in situ Nikon DF, Nikkor Q135. Lucia Pro pigment inks on Hahnemühle Fine Art Pearl 285g paper. Print made at Éric Petr Studio inspiration
I am happy to announce the MURMURS exhibition organized by the CNFAP at the La Ville A des Arts gallery in Paris 18th from 4.10 to 15.10.2023 and bringing together 41 visual artists who will express themselves on the theme of murmurs. A Vernissag will be held on this occasion on October 3 at 6:30 p.m. 🥂✨
Participating artists: Ayasaky Rikka – Barrovecchio Luc – Bauer Caroline – Belin Hélène – Bismuth Mélina – Blauth Lurdi – Braun Guy – Brebel Catherine – Bry Christine – Burdeos Rosa – Collandre Françoise – Dubois Tristan – Dudret Geneviève – Edouard André – Ferru Magdéleine – Fourmestraux Éric – François Claudine – Gendre-Bergère Christine – Gérodez Jean-Claude – Gehand Annie – Guyon Spennato Elizabeth – Jäggi Andreas – Kouninioti Catherina – Koyama-Meyer Stéphane – Lambrechts Marc – Loquen Claudine – Lorsa – Nassor Carine – NEL – Pedeau-Said Geneviève – Pelouze Anny – Petr Éric – Pichereau Alain – Pourny Anne – Sartori Ana – Searle Patrick – Shahnaei Najine – Souliotis Dimitrios – Sustrac Bernard – Tralongo Pauline – Vuerich Franco
§ § §
USEFUL INFORMATIONS
The Ville A des Arts 15 rue Hégésippe Moreau 75018 Paris Metro Place de Clichy lines 2 & 13
Open every day: from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Free entry access Presence of artists on site
The French National Council for the Plastic Arts is the French National Committee that officially represents France in the IAAA (International Association of the Plastic Arts), an NGO under the auspices of UNESCO, and issues a professional artist card. Under the impulse of the General Direction of Arts and Letters of the Ministry of National Education, the CNFAP was created in 1956. It includes, among its founding members, 20 eminent artists, including : Georges BRAQUE, Roger CHAPELAIN-MIDY, André DUNOYER de SEGONZAC, Marcel GROMAIRE, Marie LAURENCIN, André LHOTE…
Click to download the poster
ささやき 0x608EBF51
MY EXHIBITED ARTWORK
The two exhibited works are part of a short photographic novella「ささやき」produced in Japan in May 2023.
ささやき (Sasayaki), in Japanese, means “MurmurS”, the title of the theme “Murmures” in French.
These photographs are, for those who know how to listen to silence, the murmur of nature.
While my photographic artwork tirelessly questions the murmurs of the universe, I did not think that the waves that I captured that night in Kanazawa, in dialogue with the moon, transmitted to me a vibration heralding the 6.5 magnitude earthquake which occurred a few hours later, on May 5, 2023 at 2:42 p.m. in Ishikawa Prefecture.
Everything is just a murmur of these waves which constantly pass through us and transmit to us in their infinite trajectory, the echo of the World, if indeed we can interpret it.
Photographs, Hahnemühle B&R Rag 310g paper, light oak wooden box and anti-reflective and anti-UV museum glass. From left to right (below): ささやき 0x608EBF51 (2023) 30x30cm #1/3 (+1AP) and ささやき 0x604ABB51 (2023) 30x30cm #1/3 (+1AP)
ABSTRACT ART ー WORKS ON PAPER The New Realities exhibition | Paris Kyōto 2023 Hors les Murs
The exhibition of NEW REALITIES > PARIS KYŌTO < [abstract works on paper] held at the KYŌTO INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY HOUSE (KOKOKA) in the city of Kyōto from April 26 to 30, 2023, during the Kyōtographie International Festival, was an event nurtured by some very fine encounters. A mainly Japanese public came to see this exhibition, encouraging a highly constructive exchange in the spirit of opening up art and culture beyond national borders.
An opening ceremony was held on April 26, the day of the Vernissage, by Mr Fujita Hiroyuki, Director of the Kokoka hosting the exhibition, and Mr Jun Sato, organizer of the Réalités Nouvelles event. Also for this occasion, Mrs. Mikiko Tanaka, Member of the Kyōto Prefectural Assembly, and Mr. Masayoshi Imamura came to arrange two sumptuous bouquets of flowers that lit up the space throughout this magnificent exhibition. This event was also an opportunity to welcome an elementary school class, and drawing workshops and exchanges with the artists were organized to raise awareness of abstract art among this very young audience.
Video presentation of the exhibition at the end of the hangingFloral arrangement by Mikiko Tanaka さん and Masayoshi Imamura さんThe Artists (from left to right): Akane Masano さん, Shigekazu Tonomura さん, Yasushi Furutake さん (visiting artist), Éric Petr and Okayoko さん
ARTISTS OF NEW REALITIES 🇫🇷 Mohamed AKSOUH Sandrine ARS-COIGNARD Maria ARVELAIZ-GORDON Joanick BECOURT Milija BELIC Roger BENSASSON Joël BESSE Christine BOIRY Francesc BORDAS Claire BORDE Caroline BOUCHER Carol-Ann BRAUN Jeanne CHARTON Anne COMMET Ralph CUTILLO Claire DE CHAVAGNAC Diane DE CICCO DELNAU Olivier DI PIZIO Bernard DIDELLE Philippe Henri DOUCET Gilles DROUIN Yannick DUBLINEAU Sahar FOROUTAN Alain GUILLON Héloïse GUYARD Frédéric HENNINGER Stefanie HEYER Ingrid HORNEF Mary-Christine JALADON Bernard JEUFFROY Françoise KULESZA Erik LEVESQUE Alain LONGUET Pascal MAHOU Cristina MARTINEZ Sylvie MARY Jean-Paul MEISER Celia MIDDLEMISS Munira NAQUI Jean NAVAILH Roland ORÉPÜK Paola PALMERO Ana PÉREZ VENTURA Éric PETR Laurence REBOH Jun SATO Marie-Françoise SERRA Madeleine SINS Bogumila STROJNA François SUPIOT Sandrine THIÉBAUD-MATHIEU Marine VU Jacques WEYER
THE PLACE
Kyoto International Community House (kokoka) 2-1 Torii-cho, Awataguchi, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto, 606-8536 JAPAN tel : +8175-752-3010 https://www.kcif.or.jp/
“My work constitutes a thought process on the nature of light – a quest for its essence.
I borrow light, in its most primitive form, as raw material, as the foundation, the architecture of my entire photography. Light is not used as something that can show or illuminate what is around us, but only for what it really is, for its undulating, corpuscular nature.
I fashion this light in such a way that its filtering, reflection or dazzling may redefine the space I happen to be in and offer a different perception of the world.
I ask the question of whether our actual perception is but a placement of our own selves in relation to the universe, and as a result, if this perception shapes our own comprehension of reality, or should I say, of a certain reality.
My work is part of a meditative endeavor, but one where I am personally detached from any introspection. I like the idea of being crossed by atoms, of feeling so vast that we have a sense of being in every place at once, yet also focused on just one point, the one my camera happens to be located in. I engage in long working sessions to record the vibration of a place, its atomic resonance, or its indecipherable atmosphere, and like a film whose duration plays out in just one image, a story unfolds according to the diction of scenography and movement whose inspiration is in sync with the elements composing this very place.
In my work on the “Metamorphoses”, light intervenes in a specific way on the reflection of objects, so that their scene setting in situ creates figures akin to dilated bodies, figures composed of floating ethers coalescing in complex and destructured shapes that the image, when developed, restores, as if they conformed to a potential reality.
These bodies do not belong to space or time, nor do they belong to our world, they are but aggregates of waves and particles locked in a perpetual motion, elements which come and collide with my inverted T wave, just for one, brief moment.
My photographic writing is direct, that’s to say that it enters into a narrow relationship with the material. It is born from a meeting that takes but an instant, fixed on the border of temporality, caught between a being and the universe. This is what we could call a point of contact between Heaven and Earth.
There is no such thing as chance, merely synchrony. My meeting with the DF Art Project is of this nature. I would never have thought that there could exist as many common points.
And if this beautiful meeting with Déstructuralisme Figuratif took place, it is also because all the elements had come together so that my work could contribute a humble stone to their edifice. And above all, the DF Art Project involves a communion of individuals around a societal thought on human beings and the infinite possibilities of transgressing their shape through a fragmentation of the figure. A whole aspect of my work enters into consonance with this position, one where figures dilate, and where this full expansion of my imagery aptly questions the conceptualization of these shapes and their quantic connection to reality.”
by Éric Petr
About Figurative Destructuralism
The structure DF Art Project, represented by the Figurative Destructuralism movement, is an artistic collective of living plastic artists sharing a vision of art which is common to them and by which artistic work is oriented towards a fragmentation of what is real. This reality is put into perspective, distorted or dynamically transformed.
Through this conceptualization, the artists position themselves against a rising tide of individualism, where human exchange has given way to rampant loneliness. Their introspective focuses on analysis and the multidimensional creation, where the surreal comes to the fore and where, more generally, new less human, more virtual interactions are created.
These perceptions aim to reveal, through what could be called an optimistic rally cry, a situation, probably generational, of a globalized society in the throes of mutation facing – a society faced with an uncertain, ever-changing future.
Through artistic creation, the DF Art Project presents its considerations on a society where true possibilities for the emancipation of mankind as well as like the independence of human imagination are being redefined.
1946-47: the association called “Salon des Réalités Nouvelles” replaces the association “Abstraction-Création” (1931). This is the Salon de l’Abstraction, animated by the artists. 1956, then 1980: all the tendencies of abstraction are represented at the Salon, and right up to the margins of abstraction.
Text by Erik Levesque, from the 2022 Tribune of New Realities
The first “Réalités Nouvelles” exhibition took place in 1939 in Paris. It consisted of two successive exhibitions, each split into two series. First exhibition and first series from June 15 to 28, “Works by French artists”, with the participation of the Duchamp brothers and the Delaunay couple. The second series from June 30 to July 15 was devoted to “foreign artists” including Kandinsky, Kupka, Malevitch, etc. accompanied by Le Corbusier and Jeanneret’s project for a modern art museum. The second exhibition, from July 17 to 31, was devoted to “works by artists whose inobjective tendency voluntarily stopped before 1920” (with Jean Crotti, brother-in-law of Marcel Duchamp) and “works by artists after 1920” including Barbara Hepworth, Jeanne Kosnick-Kloss, Sophie Taeuber-Arp… The suite, made up of artists “who worked after 1920 in this direction”, was to take place on October 1. The declaration of war on September 1 caused him to fizzle out. Suzanne Duchamp, the sister of the brothers of the same name and wife of Jean Crotti, took part in the birth of the Salon des Réalités Nouvelles in 1946, and the Duchamp clan was finally complete!…Read more from the Tribune
Please click on each of the images to download them 👇
La Cité Radieuse | Marseille Vernissage, Monday June 14 at 5 p.m.
“I wanted to talk about my city; Marseille, a city unloved and yet so beautiful, split by its stigmata, its urban wounds, which only offers its divine protection from the Bonne Mère to those who marvel at it.”
The title “Nuit Radieuse” means “Radiant Night” and rhymes with the name of the place “La Cité Radieuse” given by the architect Le Corbusier and which means “The Radiant City”.
“Radiant night” is a photographic story realized in December 2020 for the second confinement by Éric Petr during a short stay in a room located on the 8th floor of the La Cité Radieuse’s hôtel.
About this photographic work
Le Corbusier’s “La Cité Radieuse” is not only a masterpiece of contemporary architecture but also one of the strong emblems of the Phocaean City and it is from this Unité d’Habitation which dominates the city that I had the desire to photograph the soul of my city, Marseille. From this urban portrait emerges a photographic story made up of 32 photographs.
I invite you to read the very beautiful text published in the contemporary art magazine Canoline Critiks which admirably sheds light on this work which is based on the idea that cities are only energy and that they vibrate with waves that cross them.
