The temporary exhibition - "Free Women" Nature Bodypaint - When plant art and bodypaint merge.
Updated on 8 August 2026
Here we are in the second week of our cycle, the one where we leave the tame shores for something bolder. It is time for the Free Women series. It is a creative space I particularly love because it lets me work the body in a sculptural and symbolic way. Here, the nude becomes graphic, carrying meaning and strength. It is another facet of my work, more direct, which I am delighted to share with you today..
NATURE BODYPAINTWhen plant art and bodypaint merge. |
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Nature bodypaint - when plant art and bodypaint merge
Working with bodypaint demands a particular patience and complicity. This series was born from inspiring meetings with several exceptional make-up artists, all driven by the same desire: to make the epidermis converse with the elements of living things. Our approach refused mere finery or a pattern laid on the surface. We were looking for a true symbiosis in which the organic creation seems to be born from the very lines of the model, like a second nature taking possession of the space. A true Art Nouveau, nature bodypaint.
For hours, the studio turned into a research workshop. Under the brushes, sponges and direct touches of the make-up artists, the material unfolded in layers: muted ochres, dense moss greens, traced leaf veins and cracked-bark effects. In this collective adventure, the model is never a passive support. Her presence is decisive. She inhabits the pigments with a calm authority, wearing this plant adornment with strength rather than complacency. Every breath and every muscle tension brings the painted work to life well before the first click of the shutter.
Behind the lens, my technical challenge was to honour the meticulousness of this make-up without flattening its textures. To avoid an overly enveloping light that would have smoothed the reliefs, I favoured a very directional beam, channelled through a honeycomb grid. This choice creates a frank modelling, backed by black flags to deepen the shadows. The light thus catches the roughness of the matt paint while letting the areas of bare skin breathe, revealing the complexity of the plant tones.
It is in this balance between the painter’s art and the photographer’s eye that the art of the nude finds its nobility. Free of any easy artifice, the image becomes a space of raw dreaminess. This approach to art photography transforms the artistic nude into a celebration of plant power: a sovereign, visceral, untamed presence.
To see this week’s exhibitions or all of my work, here are the options:
 The temporary exhibitions |  The Reserve the Patrons’ Circle | |
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This graphic exploration is over for this week, but the month is far from finished. In seven days, we will slip into something more muted and more tactile. Get ready for the Embodied Intimacies series, where we will set the staging aside to move closer to the skin and the senses. See you next week!
Yohann
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