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| Jean-Baptiste Ganne |
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For L.F.D.A. 02.The Illustrated Capital is a pertinent example of Jean-Baptiste Ganne’s efforts to reassert the power of the image as a vector of meaning. The project takes the form of a book (published in 2000 by Incertain Sens / Galerie Françoise Vigna, and in English and German editions by Fotohof, in 2003), and a collection of medium-format colour photographs designed to be shown in exhibitions. The project, begun in 1998, takes Karl Marx’s Capital (1867) as the synopsis for an exploration of the “spectacle of contemporary capitalism”. Drawing on the conventions of photoreportage, each photograph represents a situation or event captured on the spot and presented in relation to a particular chapter, section or paragraph of Marx’s unfinished work. Traffic jams, catwalk fashion shows, crowds at a racecourse, office interiors… Taken out of context, these images are simply ordinary depictions of modern life, scenes of contemporary reality captured hic et nunc, forming a kind of ensemble, bereft of depth or significant connections ; in the context of Marx’s work, however, they become exemplary illustrations of the continued relevance of his analysis of our economic and market systems. By restoring meaning to the pictures in this way, Jean-Baptiste Ganne delivers the photographic image from the impoverishing status so often assigned to it today : that of a consumer object. Jean-Baptiste GanneA collector of "weak images", stereotyped, stripped of meaning and specific style, Jean-Baptiste Ganne works on giving worth to the image once more as a possible vehicle of meaning. Retouching his own photographs and associating them with historical events, the artist proposes a reading of them which is new and meaningful. Having done this, he reintroduces the image into the domain of the informational, like a speech or a text, nevertheless without ever forgetting to reveal its precarious and manipulative nature. [M. A.] Jean-Baptiste Ganne was born in 1972 in Gardanne.
 Jean-Baptiste Ganne |
