Mirror / Angle-death
Friends Room, Hellenic Centre / London
Photographs 100 x 70 cm / October 2012
The photographic work proposed here by Jean-Paul Matifat is based on wandering and tracking. It accepts a singular object that the artist calls "Mirrors Worlds." The "Mirror Worlds" convex mirrors are big, about 60 cm large, round or rectangular, attached to walls or hung from poles. They are present at the crossroads, on the premises of passages and property entrances. They are easily identifiable and they are often installed on panels, striped black and white. These "Mirrors-worlds" could be similar to large urban mirrors which would be used to compensate for blind spots. These objects are intended to be practical and rational as threshold points and blind spots in the landscape. In reality however, they reveal signs of power, control and monitoring.
These images were photographed by Jean-Paul Matifat throughout his career and his travels over the years. The work of shooting meets three strict conditions: a systematic survey of the subject, the photographer's positioning to limit the reflected image and direct effacement of the mirror. There are constraints that affect the final nature of the work. The principle being that the photographed object imposes its own point of view which determines the art form of the captured image. This photographic work is a methodical subject pointing towards the control of logic through a plastic reality, which is full of poetry, architecture, territory and neighborhood life.
