Raphaëlle Peria: Accorder le néant à l'infini

Raphaëlle Peria uses photography as a medium to carry out work in the field of drawing. For some years, she has been developing a scratching technique which she uses to make new forms appear and reveal the elements of photography that are most evocative of the subject she is approaching.

Landscapes, natural elements and ecosystems are at the heart of her artistic approach and are starting points for her travels during which she takes her shots. By selecting fragments of the image, those kept as they are, she creates changes in scale and plays with different textures, a photographic materiality that has become her own style, textures produced by her technique refined over time. These games of metamorphoses bring forth new worlds. Her works here make up an environment that is both fragile and fascinating.

"[…] Elle dit aimer les arbres.

Les aimer de tous temps.

C’est son motif préféré.

[…] Ils sont, dit-elle, ‘les porteurs de notre mémoire, les gardiens de nos secrets’. D’autant qu’ils peuvent vivre beaucoup plus longtemps. Droits comme un I, ils sont tout en même temps résistants et résilients. Ils nous donnent la mesure du temps, celle de la nature dans sa plénitude, entre terre et ciel. C’est elle que célèbre l’artiste, qu’elle s’applique à mettre en lumière.

[…] Raphaëlle Peria affectionne tout ce qui touche au vivant.

Elle s’intéresse aux sciences de la vie et de la terre, au vital. La question des écosystèmes est au cœur de ses préoccupations." 

– extrait du texte De rerum natura de Philippe Piguet.

"[...]She says she loves trees. 

Loves them all the time.

It is her favorite subject.

[...] She says, "they carry our memory, they guard our secrets". What's more, they are able to live much longer. Standing straight, they are both resistant and resilient. They give us the measure of time, that of nature in its fullness, between earth and sky. This is what the artist celebrates and highlights. 

[...] Raphaëlle Peria loves everything to do with living things. 

She is interested in life and earth sciences, and vitality. Ecosystems are at the heart of her concerns."

– an extract from Philippe Piguet’s De rerum natura.

Text in English and French.

©Photographs by Raphaëlle Peria

Text by Philippe Piguet