Les sœurs Chevalme
Saint-Denis, FranceBiography
Les sœurs Chevalme are twins. For over ten years now, they have been exploring the concept of identity as being multiple through the prism of History. In their opinion, identity is a complex amalgamation that never ceases to shift, migrate, expand, associate and absorb.
This is for them a deeply felt issue: they are two individuals and yet are often perceived as one. People get them mixed up, confuse one for the other; they are one of two, the one and the other.
About the artwork
What if we reset contemporary postcolonial history by shaking up the power dynamics?
Through the use of fiction and utopian photography, this series is a reading of colonization’s double history: on the one hand, the colonial system pushed people out of their country, while on the other, it allowed French identity to expand beyond its borders.
Whether of the first, second or third generation, the children of immigrants or their descendants are forever strangers. Despite being French citizens, they are always asked where they were born, they are always seen as outsiders.
This series invents a new narrative where the formerly colonized become explorers from far-off lands, looking into the French identities of those whom some refuse to consider to be so or whom others do not know what to call.
Using long exposure night photography, these images transport the subject into an extraterrestrial dream land, a fictional world.
Artworks by the artist
