BRENNER, Frédéric

About the French photographer, Frédéric BRENNER (b. 1959, in Paris)

Frédéric BRENNER attended the Sorbonne, where he received a B.A. in French Literature and Social Anthropology in 1981. He later studied at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales and earned an M.A. in Social Anthropology awarded by the Sorbonne.
In 1978, at the age of 19, he embarked on his first photography project, an exploration of Mea Shearim, an Ultra-Orthodox Jewish neighborhood in Jerusalem. In 1981, he undertook a chronicle of Jewish communities around the world, exploring what it means to live and survive with a portable identity. He spent 25 years in over 40 countries recording the diaspora of the Jews and creating a probing pursuit of the multiplicity of dissonant identities. In 2007, he initiated, organized and was the artistic director of the 'This Place' project, which explored Israel and the West Bank as place and metaphor through the eyes of twelve major photographers. In addition to Brenner, the artists participating in the project with thier own series and photo volumes were Wendy EWALD, Rosalind Fox SOLOMON, Martin KOLLAR, Josef KOUDELKA, Jungjin LEE, Gilles PERESS, Fazal SHEIKH, Stephen SHORE, Thomas STRUTH, Jeff WALL as well as Nick WAPLINGTON. 'This Place' resulted in a major touring exhibition, a digital platform, a collective book, ten individual monographs and an exhibition tailored for university campuses.

Photo books by Frédéric BRENNER

'Jérusalem: Instants d'Éternité' (1984); 'Israel' (1988); 'Marranes' (1992); 'Jews/America/A Representation' (1996); 'Exile at Home' (1998); 'DIASPORA: Homelands in Exile' (2003); 'An Archeology of Fear and Desire' (2014)

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