D’ici là

“My photographic work is a blend of stories and approaches. These stories are personal and even intimate when I photograph themes such as memory, family, life and death. My approach is documentary when I turn to others to attempt to bear witness to their own stories. I also take images daily here and there”.
Even if he is not yet a priori a renowned figure on the young auteur photography scene in Belgium, Jérôme Hubert has already been active for quite a few years; on the periphery (Jérôme also works freelance in web design, photo, video and graphic design), and slightly episodic but with a form of gentle consistency, his relationship with photography has ended up with a personality of its own and, if not a fixed form of expression, it has a unique and endearing personality, a recognizable story: his own. Simple and essential events (meeting a woman, the birth of his daughter, the loss of his father...), whether sad or happy, are central to a story that also addresses the question of migration or uprooting, as Jérôme was born in Tunis (in 1983) and has gleaned elements of his family and cultural heritage in the Maghreb since his first series, “L’allée du retour”, a dozen years ago. 

D’ici là (From Here to There), presented as part of the Propositions d’artistes, is, therefore, human geography shaped by place and time. From his Tunisian birthplace to the crossroads of Belgian, Sicilian and Asturian paths, without any forced exoticism, this work “asks where we are going and where we come from. It responds to a dream of elsewhere, a constant desire for movement”. But it is also supplemented with mental images, immobile journeys, vital little things - like walks in the neighbouring park, during the lockdown, beyond the frame of the project we are dealing with, where we come across a little girl and dogs providing such a breath of fresh air. 

With modesty and delicacy, navigating between landscape and portrait (both in terms of image format and the appropriate distance), using a frame within a frame without being frivolous, or touches of colour without trying to look pretty, Jérôme Hubert composes an impressionist mosaic, made up of snippets of time rather than references, sensations rather than quotations. The shadows regularly draw obvious or incomprehensible signs; but the light, above all, translates or betrays sandy and ochre southern origins. Shapes and faces pass by - only those of the companion and the child take the trouble to stop and give themselves up, confident and peaceful. D’ici là is so close and yet so far, a symbolic distance that may seem insurmountable; but it is also just the right amount of momentum, the thin, magical film that separates and links two epidermises, two sensibilities.

And of what elsewhere and tenderness should we be wary?... In these excessively cold times and too label-oriented, such a free and spontaneous approach to photography is above all an invitation to share... almost a gift. 

Emmanuel d’Autreppe, exhibition curator, January 2022

Jérôme Hubert's portfolio has been selected by the Jury of the “Propositions d’artistes” competition 2021. 

Website: www.jeromehubert.be

© Jérôme Hubert, série D’ici là, 2011 - 2021