Hichem Driss

Hichem Driss (* 1968 in Tunis ) is a Tunisian photographer .

life and work

Hichem Driss graduated from the École de communication visuelle in Paris in 1993. In 1995 he returned to Tunisia and worked as a freelance photographer, often working with other photographers in the fields of design, architecture, fashion and advertising photography. In 2002 he founded his studio Barguellil in Tunis and began to experiment with new techniques. His artistic photographic works have been exhibited internationally since 1997. The volume Arab Photography Now , published in 2011, shows works by him as one of 36 artists of contemporary Arab photography who create a work of great political and cultural relevance .

In his Erreur 404 series of photos, shown in the Degagements - Tunisia One Year On 2012 exhibition in Paris, he deals with the sudden freedom from censorship after the 2011 revolution . The name of the series of photos comes from the error message 404, which was displayed when an attempt was made to access websites blocked by the dictatorship of Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali . For his exhibition at the Athens Photo Festival 2017, he used a pinhole camera to create a series of pictures that he took on the rocky coast of Tunisia. The exhibition is dedicated to those people who lost their lives on the passage across the Mediterranean.

Hichem Driss refuses in a subtle way to commit his style to documentation or reportage. He defends polyvalence. A camera is like a pen - you write with it. Depending on the topic or how you feel, you can be a journalist, poet or writer.

Exhibitions

2017: Participation in the Athens Photo Festival , Artower Agora Galleries, Athens
2013: I exist (in some way) , Bluecoat Arts Center, Liverpool
2012: Degagements - Tunisia One Year On , Paris (organized by the Institut du monde arabe )
2011: 9th Bamako Encounters African Photography Biennial , Musée National du Mali, Bamako
2011: Art Tunis Paris 2011 , group exhibition, Musée du Montparnasse , Paris
2004: Nazar: Photographs from the Arab World . International Noorderlicht Photography Festival in the Fries Museum , Leeuwarden , Netherlands
2000: Lettres d'Argiles , Institut Francais de Coopération Tunis
1998: Rencontres Africaines de la Photographie de Bamako , Musée National du Mali
1998: Les Fiestas du Sud , Marseille
1997: VI Bienal de La Habana , Centro de Arte Contemporáneo Wifredo Lam, Havana , Cuba

Illustrated books

Nazar. Photographs from the Arab world , exhibition catalog edited by Wim Melis (curator), Noorderlicht (Foundation), Fries Museum. Edition Aperture, New York 2004, ISBN 978-1-931788-85-4 (English and Arabic)
Rose Issa, Michket Krifa (ed. And texts): Arab Photography Now , Kehrer Verlag , Heidelberg 2011, ISBN 978-3-86828-189-7 (English)