Thierry Valencin - Amsterdam

Born in 1962 in the Mâconnais, Thierry Valencin, after several years spent in French Polynesia, leaves France for Germany, where he stays for almost ten years. In Frankfurt and then in Munich, he founds the Demi-Lune photography gallery, thus discovering the city’s cultural and artistic milieu. His encounters with painters, writers, filmmakers, theatre people and especially photographers gradually lead him to pick up the camera himself.

Encouraged by the quality of his first shots, he perfects his technique through various assistantships — fashion magazines, television sets, film shoots, album covers — while developing a personal writing style. From his early images a mastery of the gaze asserts itself, which will continue to deepen over the years. Despite the diversity of his experiences, his photographic path remains remarkably coherent, faithful to an initial intuition that runs through the entirety of his work.

Back in France in 1995, he dedicates himself entirely to photography. His numerous journeys nourish and confirm his view. He then-founds the Atelier Valencin, a place of research and production where he further delves into silver print techniques and develops a very personal conception of blur. In his work, grain, light and shadow do not describe the image: they make it appear, revealing the intimacy of landscapes, objects and bodies.

In 2010, he publishes Au bord de l’autre, a book bringing together thirty-four photographs taken over more than twenty years, in India, Europe, the United States and France. Conceived as a voluntary wandering, this book bears witness to an available gaze, attentive to everything that happens, where each image becomes a moment of humanity and poetry.