The RÉFLEXIONS Project

FRENCH VERSION →

FROM PERSONA TO BEING

Life sometimes leads us away from who we truly are, from our deepest values, and little by little, we come to inhabit a persona shaped by our experiences, our habits and the way others see us. A sense of dissatisfaction, disconnection or unfulfillment may then arise — as a sign that a deeper part of ourselves is asking to be recognized.

RÉFLEXIONS explores this distance between being and persona, between who we are and the image we have learned to recognize and present to the world.

The project invites us to turn this distance into a space for exploration: to shift our perspective, question our certainties, allow what lies beyond appearances to emerge — and, through photography, make it visible.

CREATING THE PHOTOGRAPHS

For RÉFLEXIONS, I guided each model in this search for a more unguarded presence, beyond the image they were accustomed to seeing in the mirror or presenting to others.

To do so, I chose a deliberately pared-back approach: no makeup, styled hair, jewellery or visible clothing. Bare shoulders erase outward signs, allowing the focus to rest on the face, the expression and the presence.

Black and white serves the same intention: to allow what is essential to emerge without colour distracting the eye. The square format, in turn, reinforces the balance and simplicity of the composition.

For each model, I created two photographs using reversed lighting setups. The poses are as similar as possible. Yet the two portraits are not made in the same way: on the left, I photograph the model directly, facing me; on the right, I photograph their reflection in a mirror while they have their back to me.

I then bring the two photographs together into a single image, separated only by the edge of the mirror. What appears to be a face and its reflection is therefore not: the reflection is an illusion.

After the portraits below, I invite you to discover behind the scenes through a photograph revealing how the images were created.

MEANING & METAPHOR

More about my artistic approach at the bottom of the page…

Nassim

BEHIND THE SCENES: FRONT-FACING PORTRAITS (LEFT) AND MIRROR REFLECTIONS (RIGHT)

MEANING & METAPHOR OF THE RÉFLEXIONS PROJECT

Beyond the emotion the photographs may evoke, RÉFLEXIONS engages those who look at them and gradually draws them through different levels of interpretation, questioning and understanding.

✦ AT FIRST GLANCE, we see a pared-back double portrait: a face and what appears to be its reflection in a mirror, with the model adopting an attentive yet passive pose, an intense gaze softened by the hint of a smile.

But on closer inspection, the living differences between the two portraits begin to emerge.

The reflection is not perfect. And this imperfection reveals itself only if we pay close attention. It invites us to wonder: why are these two portraits different? Is this really a reflection? Is one portrait real and the other false? And where does reality lie?



RÉFLEXIONS thus explores the boundary between reality and illusion — a boundary that also depends on the gaze and perception of the person observing.

✦ AT THE SECOND LEVEL, the double portrait shifts the questioning from the model to the person looking at them.

What connects these two faces, so identical and yet different? Is one more authentic than the other? Is one real and the other an illusion? And what do we base our certainties on when we try to distinguish truth from falsehood, reality from illusion?

Beyond these differences, is there a singular presence that endures and connects both portraits to the same being? What is this unique, authentic essence that allows us to recognize a person through the multiplicity of their expressions and appearances? Is reality, ultimately, what emerges beyond appearance?

RÉFLEXIONS invites us to step back from our familiar way of seeing, to shift our point of view and move beyond the habitual and the known, in an attempt to discern the being behind the persona.

✦ THE THIRD LEVEL reverses the roles and draws the viewer to the other side of the mirror.

As we continue to observe the two portraits and examine their differences, we eventually begin to perceive what remains: behind these two faces, it is always the same being who is there.

And then the gaze shifts. At the very moment we begin to recognize this being behind appearances, we realize that they, too, are looking at us.

From the other side of the image, the model is watching us intently. Two pairs of eyes are fixed upon us, as though this being we were trying to grasp behind appearances had, in turn, recognized us.

This reversal heightens the sense of unreality and further blurs the boundary between what we believed to be real and what we took to be illusion.

And within this moment of uncertainty, something within us may begin to emerge in turn. The being revealed in the image seems to speak directly to the being within us, as though awakening what, behind our own appearances, had been waiting for its own moment to emerge.

RÉFLEXIONS then becomes the encounter of one true being with another. An invitation to move beyond illusion and rediscover, beyond our appearances, the memory of what connects us — and inspires us to live, love and create together.