Laetitia Heisler - Visual Artist - Analog double exposure photographer - Hamburg - Menstrual art

13.09 – 22.09.24: Group exhibition "Nature exposed” curated by Loosenart at Millepiani - Rome (IT)

03.08 – 14.09.24: Group exhibition "Nature" at Glasgow Gallery of Photography (UK)

04.07 -31.07.24: Group exhibition "Yellow" at Glasgow Gallery of Photography (UK)

02.07.24: Projection of one photograph “Gladiatrices” Les Rencontres d’Arles (FR)

14.06 - 31.07.24: Solo exhibition at Kulturstation - Rodenaes (DE)

15.03 - 12.04.24: Group virtual exhibition "Shadows" at Royal Blue Gallery (UK)

08.03 - 14.03.24: Group exhibition "Inner World" at Boomer Gallery - London (UK)

01.03 - 25.03.24: Group exhibition at Analog Art Photography - Leipzig (DE)

07.04 - 30.04.23: Digital exhibition at Akron Gallery - Trondheim (NOR)

10.03.23: Duo exhibition “Art Night” at Pack & Schnack - Niebüll (DE)

04.01.23: Online exhibition : ‘Art of Illusion - Analog Forever Magazine currated bi L.Toboz’

• 07.24: “Humanoid Vegetalis” picture in Die Zeit

• 06.24: Article in the Wochenschau

• 05.24: "Golden Number" picture in The Luna Collective Magazine

• 04.24: Article in Optiko Journal

• 03.24: "Behind organs" picture in Analog Forever Magazine

• 12.23: Interview in Analog Forever Magazine

• 11.23: Interview in Lomography Magazine

• 12.22: Interview in Lomography Magazine

• 12.22: TV Show "Comeback der Analogen Fotografie" SAT 1

• 11.22: Article in Trois Points Magazine

• 09.22: Interview in Lomography Magazine

• 09.22: Interview in Alter Analog

• 01.21: Interview in Lomography Magazine
  
  

• 07.24: Lomography x Copenhagen Photo Festival "ENTANGLEMENT" Grand Prize Worldwide

• 05.24: 3rd Prize of the Jury "GLADIATRICES" award Wipplay x On Stage Festival
  

• 10.23: Lomography Awards "TEN AND ONE"

• 12.22: Instant Photography – “NOW OR NEVER” award

• 12.22: Award « BFI X Lomography : IN DREAMS ARE MONSTERS » Second Price
  
  

Agitated by nature, analog photography provides me the balance I need: precision and patience. Double exposure, which I taught myself, is the main foundation of my artistic work. For five years, I have been exploring its possibilities by exposing the film twice in my camera, sometimes with years between the shots. This concept allows me to push the boundaries of time and space by bringing together images that are temporally and spatially distant. This way I can create unique and surreal compositions using elements from the tangible reality as we see it.

Nature, being one of my greatest sources of artistic and spiritual inspiration, leads me to associate portraits with forest or floral elements, as seen in my project "Humanoi Vegetalis Stories," a meditation on impermanence and interdependence. Self-portraits also play a central role in my work, particularly in the series "Beyond Mirror’s Gaze: Altered Self-portraits" and "Journey from Cultivated Chaos to Bliss." By staging myself, I seek to release burdensome and undesirable emotions that I do not wish to identify with, such as feelings of injustice, anger, and victimization. These works represent an introspective dive into my inner world, exploring human identity and vulnerability, a deep need that I wish to share.

Each of my creations stems from visions that appear to me during sleep or moments of solitary daydreaming. The darkroom is my laboratory of experimentation where I break the rules of conventional photography by adding liquids to the development process or using unusual color filters in the enlarger, resulting in surprising colors. These outcomes, far removed from the reality as we see it, allow the observer to escape from their rational mind to explore their "second brain," the imagination.

Mastering the entire process, from shooting to printing, gives me an indescribable sense of accomplishment in a rapidly evolving virtual world. My inspirations are many and varied, ranging from iconic figures in photography to visionary artists and Indian spirituality. Gandhi, Valie Export, John Lennon, Mary Ellen Clark, and Claude Cahun have a profound impact on my quest for truth and artistic expression.

As an artist, my intention is to use what we see to reform it in order to "give image" to the invisible aspects of our lives: troubles, thoughts, relationships, identity, suffering, but also love and joy. Why do we place so much importance on what we see when it is the intangible that affects us the most? By illustrating these intangible realities, my ambition is to encourage my audience to introspect more deeply. Some of my works evoke pleasant emotions, such as wonder, while others will disturb. My goal is to highlight our contradictions in a poetic way, to provoke individual questioning for the common good.

Laetitia Heisler, February 2024

“Laetitia Heisler is a self-taught French/German analogue photographer based in Northern Germany, who grew up in the South of France. She specializes in double and sometimes triple exposures, sometimes waiting years before combining the two or three frames. Fastidiously printing all her own work, she often spends hours in the darkroom.

Man Ray, the Dadaist painter and photographer, once said to me: “The artist is the only true sage. He/she comes to us with an open mind and with open hands. When his/her work confronts others, he/she is not up for trial. It is the spectator, if anyone, who is putting himself on record. Time has proven this again and again… The strees are full of admirable craftsmen, but so few practical dreamers.”

I think Heisler is such an admirable dreamer, and of course, it was Man Ray in the 1920s that, in his Parisian darkroom, began experimenting with double exposures and created his famous “rayographs”.

Heisler’s floral self-portraits are exquisite, sensitively composed, and bursting with emotion and lyrical vibrations. Her oeuvre is very dream-like and exudes a sort of ‘Alice in Wonderland’ world. I admire her statment that “I put the film in hot water with flowes and soap and let dry for months before shooting.”

Heisler has traveled the world with her trusty Pentax and other cameras. Capturing other people, it is her own self-portraits that I find so impressive. Her nude collage with a sunflower is both surrealistic and a nod to the Dadaist tradition.

Laetitia Heisler is a consummate artist, working alone in her darkroom, always experimenting, and keeping alive the tradition of Man Ray and his ilk in the 1920s and 30s. This is an artist that I will continue to follow. And as she herself wrote: “The best picture is the one you will never be able to capture!” Well, I think that perhaps she has?” -

Anthony Fawcett
Art Curator and personnal assistant of John Lennon & Yoko Ono in the late 60’s - March 2024