Nelly Maurel has created a collection of "ethnographic photographs" based on a fairly simple subject: women handling and "activating" eggs or showing themselves with eggs in unusual ways. What we discover is a series of enigmatic images, which may have us doubt their authenticity because their meaning is so hard to grasp—but at the same time seem credible because the photographs look so familiar. These images mimic those of anthropological photography, of anthropological travel, but also of documentary and artistic photography, known and exhibited in Western countries. Nelly Maurel gets these images by using tools derived from AI, artificial intelligence, and other complementary image technologies, to harmonise them, edit them, embellish them, and make them believable.

Nelly Maurel


Admission included with the Rencontres d’Arles 2024 pass.