Fine Art nominee

In the late 1950s, Bernd and Hilla Becher initiated a photographic inventory of the architectural heritage from the industrial era, then marked by obsolescence and destined for disappearance. Their photographs, perfectly neutral due to their adherence to a systematic protocol, unveil the formal variations among the buildings photographed (blast furnaces, gas holders, water towers, etc.), which they refer to as Anonymous Sculptures.
In resonance with their work, the Erased series actualizes a process of erasure operating here at an earlier stage. Focusing on blue water towers against clear skies, captured frontally in direct sunlight, these images reveal only evanescent outlines. In this way, they symbolize the paradigm shift at play in the post-industrial society which now strives to conceal its underlying material infrastructures. This is particularly true for the physical structures at the core of the digital world (data centers, undersea cables, rare earth mines, etc.), perpetuating the myth of the immateriality of digital images and files.

Born in 1984, Tommy Goguely lives and works in Bordeaux. A graduate in fundamental physics and holder of a master’s degree in aeronautical engineering, he started photography as a self-taught amateur. After a three-year course at the Bordeaux Fine Arts School, he redirected his practice towards works with more conceptual influences. Fuelled by image theories, his experimentation now mostly revolves around questioning the photographic medium through the lens of contemporary digital society.

In 2019, he initiated a large body of works titled "Palimpsests". This term refers to a parchment where the original writing has been erased to make way for a new text on the same support. It accurately reflects the intent behind this project. Indeed these photographs take the form of contemporary rewritings of iconic works from the history of photography, translated into the new context of digital society. Initiating a dialogue with techniques and theories of the past, they offer a reflection about the concept of post-photography and question the evolution of the medium in the era of its alleged disappearance.