Benjamin Barda carried out his first photo projects in Africa. A graduate in political science and anthropology, he initially worked as a journalist for several years.
He chose photography in 2009, in particular portraiture and staging, turning his attention to marginalised worlds, such as young people reintegrating society through boxing, or chibanis (elderly North African workers) in a social housing complex.
In 2019, he began a long-term personal project on the theme of the inner journey: he revisited his archives, produced self-portraits and performances. He questions the nature of our deep connection with images, or how they relate to unconscious mental and spiritual imprints.
In a society that has become epileptic, his obsessions become the matrix of his work: questioning imbalance, speed and vertigo.
Are we on the edge of the abyss?
Between falling and ecstasy, between memory and amnesia, he wonders about the place of man, his identity.
In 2021, he began a dreamlike and surrealist series, exploring madness through the allegorical character of a young woman (Aerolite). On this theme, he was selected to take part in the Sunnhordland Museum artist residency at Halsnøy Monastery in Norway in 2022, where he produced the Døgnvill series on the relationship between states of expanded consciousness and photography. He has exhibited this series in Norway and Paris.
He also explores social issues through fiction, often with a humorous tone, and by creating slightly offbeat characters, which he sometimes plays himself. An invitation to imagine a new world where laughter has triumphed over anxiety.
To talk about our hurried times, he has created Watasia, a multifaceted artistic project, the story of a utopian country that produces and sells naps to the whole world.
All photographs and frescoes on this site are protected by copyright: © Benjamin BARDA – Use without authorisation is prohibited.