Jean Vincent Simonet (FR/CH, b. 1991) graduated from Lausanne’s ECAL in 2014. Currently based between Paris and Zurich, he juggles commissioned work and editorial assignments with a range of personal projects. Simonet has exhibited in renowned institutions and galleries such as Foam Amsterdam, Fotomuseum Winterthur, the Centre de la photographie Genève, Cabaret Voltaire Zürich and Webber Gallery, London. His works are found in various public and private collections, including the Vontobel Art Collection, Musée de l’Elysée Lausanne, Foam Amsterdam, Swiss Post and the LUMA Foundation, Arles.
In his recent work, Simonet’s photographs are printed on fiberless plastic coils commonly used in offset printing. Here, the ink is projected from the machine onto a slick surface, without becoming completely embedded in it. Each image is thus in an inchoative state: it is still wet, moving and somewhat organic. From coating or sweeping to blow drying, Simonet has investigated and applied a wide range of techniques to these unstable images, all of which produce specific and peculiar effects. As a result, his works – at the border of photography and painting – cannot be duplicated.
These experiments were inspired by Simonet’s personal history: his family owns a printing factory in the Lyon region, which has been passed down from generation to generation. The importance of this site took on new meaning as the very subject of his photographs. In documenting the factory, Simonet focused on small details and non-human entities rather than photographing its workers.
To use the space as he did – working with its resources and capturing its image – was both a means to disrupt its traditional function and to situate himself within this family lineage, to occupy a position he feels is his own.