Biennale De l'Image Tangible 2025

During a month of exhibitions and events located in the East and the center of Paris, the Biennale de l'Image Tangible presents a selection of works that tend to break free from a classic use of the photographic medium.

Overview

Whether it is looking for new supports, hybrid techniques or a new relationship to reality, this event tends to demonstrate that photography never stops inventing. In this, the Tangible Image Biennale supports the emergence of new languages ​​and new practices related to photography: a photograph which upsets the assumptions of reality, a photograph which changes in nature, form and postulate, and which thus participates in a broadening of the field of its discipline.

The fourth edition of the Tangible Image Biennale take place in November, around an exhibition at Espace Niemeyer and five exhibitions in Paris. As well as an Atelier Martel prize, concerts and portfolio readings.

Among the participating locations, the 100 Etablissement Culturel Solidaire brings together works by artists Ivan Murit, Kia Sciarrone, Maxim Zmeyev, Dora Tishmann, Alice Pallot and Jonàs Forchini. Ivan Murit's research involves creating generative systems and software tools, inspired by natural phenomena like morphogenesis, to produce images that acquire a form of autonomy. He focuses on the physical and material process of digital printing, using this "tool-based" practice to critically explore our relationship with technology while maintaining a sensory connection to the natural world. Kia Sciarrone is a Vienna-based conceptual artist whose work, often rooted in self-portraiture, explores the nuanced facets of personal and queer identity. Through evocative compositions, he engages with the complexities of gender, sexuality, and cultural heritage as both a form of introspection and a gentle call for diversity.

Maxim Zmeyev's post-digital practice questions the links between virtual images and photographic materiality. He captures "in-game" environments from video games and transposes them into historical, manual prints (like kallitypes), a process that slows the digital flow and gives a new, tangible body to simulated universes.

Now focusing mainly on photography, Dora Tishmann draws inspiration from the myths of Creation and the origins of the universe. Her work uses techniques of transformation and metamorphosis to explore foundational themes surrounding the body, writing, matter, and the invisible. Alice Pallot and Jonàs Forchin share a focus on environmental themes, specifically on making the invisible visible. Forchin, a professional diver, photographs unseen and "unsightly" underwater landscapes like industrial zones, while Pallot uses a science-fictional aesthetic to translate scientific data and reveal the future impacts of human activity.

Atelier Néerlandais presents Dutch Workshop, including works by Céline Guillerm, Florence Pinson Ynden, Olivier Gain, and Ming Pang. Céline Guillerm is a multidisciplinary artist whose work combines photography, video, and ceramics to explore bodies in motion, vestiges, and heterotopias. Her sensory, flash-based photography gives a large place to the "off-screen," creating a sense of strangeness that oscillates between documentary and visual art. Florence Pinson-Ynden is a visual artist whose work, primarily made from paper and fallen materials, is a metaphorical exploration of Life's power, fragility, and resilience. Her delicate and repetitive sculptures and installations invite contemplation on human consciousness and the impermanence of existence.

Olivier Gain's practice is rooted in an exploration of artificial light and the history of technology, often revisiting past inventions to see what stories emerge. His recent experiments with the electroluminescence of graphite explore the materiality of images at the crossroads of photography and drawing, addressing themes like celestial bodies and the noise of images. Ming Pang’s photographic work explores the links between history, memory, and visual representation, focusing on the reconstruction of historical places and the observation of daily life. By mixing photography, archives, and installation, she questions the transmission of the past and the construction of collective narratives.