Valérie Belin and Patrick Tosani: Photography as Face and Surface

The article reviews two concurrent exhibitions in Paris: Valérie Belin at Galerie Xippas (September 12 – October 31) and Patrick Tosani's "Regards" at Galerie Emmanuel Perrotin (September 14 – November 2). Both photographers, who previously avoided the human face, now confront visagéité—but on their own terms. Belin's work evolves from objects (crystal animals, mirrors, wedding dresses, flowers, meat, crashed cars) to bodybuilders and Moroccan brides, and finally to a triptych of Transsexuals, Black Women, and Models. She refuses psychological portraiture; her faces are clinical, frontally lit on white backgrounds. Transsexuals appear in a precarious gender between, Models mimic a standardized "ready-to-wear" face, while Black Women achieve a sovereign iconicity through the photographic process. Tosani's "Regards" follows his earlier series of figurines in ice, Braille portraits, skulls, and headless clothed bodies. He uses starched shirts molded into organic architectures, now with children from a school in Chalon-sur-Saône (birthplace of the Niépce museum). The shirts open like corollas around the children's faces, integrating skin and fabric through light. Both artists reject the term "portrait," emphasizing surface over depth, skin as architecture. The article also notes Philippe Ortel's book "La Littérature à l'ère de la photographie" and Christian Milovanoff's catalogue "Conversation Pieces."