Yohann
 

EXPLORER OF INTIMACY

 

An engineer by training, a sculptor for four years in Guadeloupe, a graphic designer in the early days of Photoshop, a therapist and hypnosis practitioner, a consultant to large corporations, a workshop leader, founder of a transrational tarot school and... a photographer for fifteen years. A path that goes off in every direction, with one thing at the centre: encounter. That moment when someone sees themselves differently, when an image gives back a part of themselves they thought was lost. Sculpture looked for the intimacy of form. Photography looks for the intimacy of light and presence.

 

Why women?

 

I photograph mainly women because their mystery calls to me. I try to bring to light what, in them, escapes categories: nuance, plurality, contradictions, strengths, paradoxes. I may come from another generation, and I always carry the same awareness: it is an absolute honour to see a woman nude in front of my lens. A responsibility, even. An ethic of looking.

 

The stance

 

For years, I photographed a graceful vision of femininity: fairies, delicate nudes, dreams. It was models who opened my eyes. Too well-behaved, they told me. A smoothed-over image of woman, arranged by a man. They were right. By choosing grace alone, I was leaving a whole side of the feminine outside: the primitive, the wild, power, desire that asks no one’s permission.

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So I opened up this territory. Strong, dark, free, frankly sensual women. These images are more erotic, and I stand behind them: femininity in all its diversity includes this side too, and leaving it out would amount to photographing half a woman.

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Each image is born of a free collaboration between consenting adults. Access to these rooms goes through a ticket or a membership, and that door lets me choose who comes in.

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Every session is a co-creation

 

The model is an artist. The light decides. As for me, I frame what is being invented. A session takes time: a shared idea, tests, silences, and the moment when something appears. Unoptimised gestures, unpredictable angles, real skin — that is what makes the image.

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At a time when bodies can be fabricated in a few seconds, each of my photographs comes from an encounter: a woman, a studio, light, trust, and hours of work. That has become rare, and it is precisely what interests me.

 

A library of the living

 

In fifteen years, I have gathered more than thirty thousand images. I made them in order to understand. Today I share them: a living library of images that exist because they were lived.

 

Over time, Yes Photographies has become a living archive and a place where one learns to look.