Lore Stessel explains her material view of photography which has led her to a unique way of working
2 July, 2024
Lore Stessel is a photographic artist driven by the expressive movement and connection of nature. Working with unique processes and large canvases, her tactile prints are formed by strokes of light-emulsion and paint. After showcasing her work at Art Brussels 2024 with Rossicontemporary, the artist is now collaborating with Galerie Les filles du calvaire in preparation for her upcoming exhibit at Photo Paris 2025.
What drives me is human connection. I feel touched by the beauty of body expression, particularly in the gestures we’re not aware of. These are often the most beautiful, they tell a lot about who we are. We carry a history inside of our body: our own history, what we live, but also what our parents and their parents lived. It's all encrypted in our DNA, and the way we move is directed by that.
I began working with dancers as they can express so much in a given time. I invite them to provide improvisations in a place which they feel connected to. When the energy is right, I feel a strong spiritual connection. We have a moment of exchange: they dance for me and I give them images in return. I return with a pile of negatives to develop, and reflect on how I can express the connection of time and space.
Through these processes you reflect on the dancer’s identity, whilst naturally subjecting yourself into the images?
Exactly, it's about who they are, who I am, and then also who the viewer is. It's the responsibility of many things and people before an artist's work really arrives in the right way to a person — if there is a right way, I don't know.
Reflecting on your show “Vague” during Photo Paris, I am intrigued by the tactility of your prints. Can you explain the method you use to achieve the distinct textures in your works?
Lore Stessel: To form the prints I paint with a light-sensitive emulsion on the canvas in the darkroom. With standard darkroom prints, emulsion is being put on the paper by a machine so it appears perfect, yet as I do this process myself, it's very imperfect. For me, this makes the work come alive. There are many mistakes visible in each print, many little things that shouldn’t be there. The show is also thanks to the gallerist Charlotte who has a very beautiful way of curating my images. She took time to bring together images from different series and moments in time. It was a beautiful collaboration.
Everything we create is just a fraction of what nature makes, and yet it's all aligned. I perceive nature the same way as a beautiful dance, as someone smoking a cigarette in a very authentic way.
How do you feel about your images from unique series being placed together, re-contextualised into a single display?
It can be very powerful, such as with my recent series As The Sea Remembers The Sky which displayed with Rossicontemporary at Art Brussels 2024. I created the images last summer, focusing on those moments when you feel free of all pressures and stresses. That's something that water does to us. You float, you release the heaviness of standing. You just let your body be, let the wind take you away. The images were made in this atmosphere and it can be beautiful when a series can express just that. However, within this series, I have re-directed the narrative to an old church that has been shut down since the war. I used the building’s history as a contrast for the lightness of the water and wind. Because of the heaviness you can enjoy the lightness, and vice versa. That's what the series became about.
It's freeing for me to work like this, to create tension through a limited amount of space and images. The exhibition in Paris was a question of showcasing the same quality of tension with images from separate projects. It was about opening up and re-contextualising my archive to tell a new story. Yet, the basis of my work has always been the same. It derives from a need for connection: a desire to be around people, to share time and space being touched by nature. Everything is connected so reconnecting images in a different way makes sense to me. Everything we create is just a fraction of what nature makes, and yet it's all aligned. I perceive nature the same way as a beautiful dance, as someone smoking a cigarette in a very authentic way.
Lore Stessel: I'm in the dark with chemicals so I feel a bit disconnected sometimes, but in the gestures and in the energy between me and the canvas, for sure. It's not always all fun, there's also heavy aspects in the printing process when I begin to question my practice.
What makes you feel that way?
Printing can be overwhelming. Outside the sun is shining and yet I spend my days in a dark place. When I create something that I'm very happy about, it's like a party, but in this same moment I'm terribly critical of myself. I need time to accept what I've made, to start appreciating it little by little.
To say you're so self-critical, it's interesting that you still embrace these natural mistakes.
There’s great contradictions within this technique, it forces me to appreciate a form of ugliness. It's a technique that makes an image visible, yet also breaks it down. In my initial years using this technique I was breaking the images down much more than I am now. I am beginning to leave more space for the image, and I'm less active with the painting. I used to only create half of each picture, leaving a lot of the canvas empty for strokes of paint. It was much more material-based.
What changed?
I think I'm becoming less of a painter and more of a photographer. I’ve begun working with groups of dancers so it’s now more important that we are part of a community. Togetherness on our planet is going so wrong in many ways. It's something that I'm really trying to investigate with photography as my medium.
I'm currently holding a two year residency in the Art Centre of Bilbao. They've given me all the means to spend time and space with groups of people, with dancers and non-dancers. I just ask them to come, to be together and see what happens. It's very awkward but also very beautiful. I'm putting a lot of energy into that now to see what it means to be together, and how I can make this energy visible.