Almine Rech Editions is pleased to present 'Of Things Past (Villefranche, July 2022)', a limited edition serigraph by Jean-Baptiste Bernadet, produced by Atelier Hugo Janin.

Jean-Baptiste Bernadet’s photograph of bathers in a mediterranean sunset is one of the extra exposures that often comes as a surprise, like an involuntary memory at the end of a roll of 35mm film. The monochromatic strip on the right side of the image, which marks the end of the roll, echoes the end of the day, thereby extending the metaphor of things past.

This photograph was taken by the painter during a summer spent in the south of France where he was installing an exhibition at La Citadelle in Villefranche-sur-mer. Screen printed in CMYK, 'Of Things Past (Villefranche, July 2022)' is an edition (25 + 3 AP) on Rives paper (50 x 65 cm), which memorializes a fleeting moment. Friends and lovers might be present in the image but the picture is not one of “those photographs of a being that we remember less by seeing than by thinking”—the kind of simulacra that Proust condemned.

Part of the proceeds from the sales of this edition will go to the Société des amis de Marcel Proust. The funds will put toward the restoration of the grave of Alfred Agostinelli (1888-1914)—Marcel Proust’s chauffeur and secretary who was also the main inspiration for Albertine in À la recherche du temps perdu (1913), and who passed away at the age of 25 when his plane crashed into the sea near Antibes.

This limited edition is now available for international purchase via the Almine Rech Editions website.

Photo credit: Useful Art Services.