PHILIPPE PÉTREMANT

It is through the ordinary, the usual and the mundane that Philippe Pétremant finds the privileged material on taking photographs of enlarged still lives, which he uses to contest the legitimacy and visibility of its representation.

The frailness of the eye

Philippe Pétremant is interested in everyday objects, the triviality of which can nevertheless not annihilate the decorative character. Images already made, ornamental motives, advertising supports and other every day images offer the raw material for photographs that question our perception and the different properties of decorative elements.
Through an exploratory process - he assembles objects and through the photograph he sees what will come of it - and a great savings of means, the photographer demonstrates the frailness of the eye. He questions the identity of the object in representation, by playing with the overlapping of motives and the trompe-l’oeil technique.

A will for aesthetic neutrality

Philippe Pétremant’s photographs are exercises in style on the theme of still lives, and often refer to painting.  They are mischievous glances to Watteau, Fragonard and Ingres, a homage to Bernard Frize’s work whose will for an aesthetic neutrality is very close to that of the photographer’s.