Nicolas Reboul, a photographer from France, has been exploring various styles and currents of the form.
Starting as an assistant to a portrait and industrial photographer, he then moved to work with sports magazines in France and the UK. The next step of his career was training in conceptual photography. The diverse experience brought Reboul to his current theme of focus—the interactions between humans and their environment through visual storytelling and a documentary approach.
The artist turns the lens to the sea and forest, exploring the primal connection of the human soul and nature. “The forest’s soul is that part of us that has remained wild and cries out. It is the soul of man that recognizes itself in the living,” Reboul explains. His photography exudes longing for freedom. His quiet images show people as an integral, organic part of nature, looking for connection that can be found only within themselves, as it is not lost but muffled by the noise of the industrial and technological age.
The sea, the coastline, and the forest are the elemental pillars of Reboul’s work. A quote from Hemingway’s “The Old Man and the Sea” comes to mind when viewing his pieces: “But man is not made for defeat. A man can be destroyed but not defeated.” There is no such thing as said defeat in the photographer’s vast, bleak maritime landscapes; here, lonesomeness takes the form of solitary reflection, embodying both peace and freedom.
Comfortable in the hidden duality of his art, Reboul perceives his work as both poetic and documentary. He ponders with disillusionment and perhaps nostalgia as he watches the southern coastline of France slowly fade away. “I seek to present a poetic perspective in my documentary photography,” he explains, “using a triptych of thought, ethics, and political aesthetics.” Against the progressive, exploitative background of our times, he believes it is nature that should ultimately prevail.
Read our “Aberration” issue in full
The 31 artists featured in RAWGUE. Magazine’s 5th issue stray from the expected, taking untrodden paths, contemplating imperfection, solitude in its many forms, and the ongoing process of self-acceptance. Through shifting perspectives, their works explore what it means to look at oneself from the outside, as if through broken glass.
We’re a team of writers using our craft to spotlight art in its most honest form. RAWGUE. started as a bi-monthly editorial experiment where each issue’s theme is dictated by the submitted work, thus removing editorial bias from the equation and preserving a more raw approach. We focus on all forms of poetry: written, photographed, painted, drawn, and filmed.
