The Franco-British photographer Sabine Villiard propels us into her world of glamour, where Dadaism dialogues with fashion and beauty, capturing images that are stylised and textured, colourful and luminous.
Sabine Villiard moved to Paris from her native London in the late 1980s, launching her career in the mid-1990s. Since then, this former English literature graduate has fashioned a diverse portfolio where her vision of fashion, beauty and art delights the editorials of major magazines (Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, Madame Figaro, Schön), international brands (Clarins, Shiseido, Giorgio Armani) and celebrities (Monica Bellucci, Elle Fanning, Tahar Rahim, Mélanie Thierry). Sabine Villiard is a follower of the Dada movement, which is reflected in her inventive, varied and sophisticated compositions. Her style, often detail-inclined, plays with vibrant colours, obsessive red, skin texture, powdery make-up, glitter power, light intensity, water reflections and all manner of accessories.
VARYING GAZES
This virtuoso provokes emotions through her work, some of which borders on the pictorial. She handles indoor and outdoor shots with ease, fusing aesthetics and narrative. Her know-how extends to the production of short promotional films, or more experimental ones flirting with Dadaism and dance. But it is above all through her more personal projects, dedicated to her travels and urban reports that she considerably broadens her field of action. She captures people, landscapes, streets and environments; from New York to Thailand, via the Camargue. At the same time, the photographer strives to keep the Villiard Photos Foundation alive, in memory of her father Georges Villiard, a passionate fan of the medium who took her on his photographic peregrinations from the age of nine. It’s a passion she’s never abandoned. Better still, she has now transcended it.
