• The situations suggest both empathy with the robot and, at the same time, a certain distance.

    Vincent Fournier's The Man Machine project questions the predictable evolution of artificial creatures, robots, and other avatars in our daily lives. With the support of several humanoid robotics laboratories, he has staged "speculative fictions" that depict everyday scenes where the robot appears similar to a human. The photographs are realistic reconstructions of ordinary situations: at work, at home, in the street, during leisure time.

     

    The situations suggest both empathy with the robot and, at the same time, a certain distance. This idea aligns with the scientific theory of the Uncanny Valley by Japanese roboticist Masahiro Mori, wherein the more similar an android robot is to a human, the more its imperfections appear monstrous to us.

     

    Vincent Fournier aims to question the spectator's perspective caught between these two polarities, navigating between identification and distancing processes with the robot. He plays with this precarious balance, imagining everyday situations on the verge of a tipping point with the complicity of Japanese laboratories. Fournier also created a short film that explores this ambiguity, where robots become more human, and humans become more like robots.

     

    The Man Machine series has been exhibited in various museums, galleries, and institutions, including the Mori Art Museum Tokyo, Design Museum Gent, Festival Lianzhou, Photo Taiwan Design, Museum MAK Austrian Museum of Contemporary Art, Fondazione MAST, Hyundai Motor Studio Busan, Les Rencontres d 'Arles, Gewerbemuseum Winterthur, V&A Dundee, and Vitra Design Museum.

    • Vincent Fournier, HRP-2 #1 [Kawada], Promet Developed by AIST, Tochigi, Japan, 2010
      Vincent Fournier, HRP-2 #1 [Kawada], Promet Developed by AIST, Tochigi, Japan, 2010
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    • Vincent Fournier, Kobian Robot #1 [Takanishi Laboratory], Waseda University, Tokyo, Japan, 2010
      Vincent Fournier, Kobian Robot #1 [Takanishi Laboratory], Waseda University, Tokyo, Japan, 2010
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    • Vincent Fournier, Reem B #8 [Pal], Barcelone, Spain, 2010
      Vincent Fournier, Reem B #8 [Pal], Barcelone, Spain, 2010
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    • Vincent Fournier, The Man Machine Reem B #2 [Pal], Barcelone, Spain, 2010
      Vincent Fournier, The Man Machine Reem B #2 [Pal], Barcelone, Spain, 2010
    • Vincent Fournier, The Man Machine; Murata Boy #1 (Murata), Head Office Building, Nagaokakyo-100 shi Kyoto, Japan, 2010
      Vincent Fournier, The Man Machine; Murata Boy #1 (Murata), Head Office Building, Nagaokakyo-100 shi Kyoto, Japan, 2010
    • Vincent Fournier, Twendy-One robot and Professor Shigeki Sugano, [Sugano Laboratory], Waseda University, Tokyo, Japan, 2010
      Vincent Fournier, Twendy-One robot and Professor Shigeki Sugano, [Sugano Laboratory], Waseda University, Tokyo, Japan, 2010
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  • For more information on available edtions and prices, please contact the gallery via email at info@theravestijngallery.com
  • Vincent Fournier (b. 1970, Burkina Faso) is a French photographer whose work explores the past, present and future in relation...
    Vincent Fournier (b. 1970, Burkina Faso) is a French photographer whose work explores the past, present and future in relation to utopian ideas of space travel; how has the past influenced the present? What are expectations for the future and has the future already happened?
    After an education in both sociology and the visual arts, Fournier studied at the National School of Photography in Arles to obtain his diploma in 1997 before working as a creative director and photographer within the advertising and film industry. In 2004, he left to travel around the world which would provide the space and time to realise his first series, Tour Operator. This was also the starting point of many characteristics that now define Fournier’s practice; a shrewd attention to architectural form, a precise, rudimentary aesthetic and a compulsion to render contrasts in scale. 
     
    His works can be found in the permanent collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (MET) New York, the Centre Pompidou Paris, MAST Foundation Bologna, the Vontobel Art Collection Zürich, Baccarat Art Collection New-York, Domaine des Etangs Massignac, the LVMH contemporary Art collection Paris (with Le Bon Marché) or Fondation Bullukian Lyon among others.