Seminar with Jean-François Chevrier

Artists at work. A short history of photography

The artist portrait is a genre, or more precisely a sub-genre of the portrait, which itself played a dominant role in photographic practice for many years. Since the invention of photography, it has accompanied the evolutions and permutations of the media’s myth of the artist as demiurge, eccentric, recluse, demented genius or other. My approach to the artist’s portrait is from a different angle, namely that of the art document, with the aim of setting out a history of modern art since Cézanne, Atget and Gordon Craig.

The artists are seen in their studios or other places where they work. Such photographs may be considered ‘art documents’ in two respects: on the one hand, because they provide information about an artistic activity (painting, sculpture, photography, performance, dance, film, etc.) and, on the other, because they are themselves moments and landmarks of a photographic art.

At times, the author of the image merges with the model, in which case we speak of a ‘self-portrait’. At other times, the image is a decisive or fundamental component of the activity, especially in the area of ‘performance’. Some photographers have produced images which, in addition to providing information about the moment, offer a carefully thought-out interpretation of the artist’s work, or in other words, a visual thought analogous to a critical text. Such works are of both documentary and critical value.

My intention is to show how the art document has contributed to the redefinition of the very idea of the artwork within the history of modern art.

Jean-François Chevrier (1954) is an Art historian, art critic, exhibition curator, professor at the Beaux-arts de Paris since 1988, he was the founder and editor-in-chief of the magazine Photographies (1982-5), general advisor for the Documenta X (1997). For 40 years he has been working on the exchanges between art and literature, modern art (including photography), art since the 1960’s, public space and architecture, and has accompanied the work of very diverse artists.

*Activity in the collaboration framework between Fundació Per Amor a l’Art and Master’s Degree in Photography at the UPV. The cost of registration is partially granted by FPAA.

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