Sauveur David

French photographer and illustrator born in 1974, represented by VU’ since 2001, lives in the Côtes d’Armor (France)

Born to a painter father and an architect mother, David Sauveur was introduced to the visual arts at a very early age and devoted himself to photography as a teenager. In 1994, at the age of nineteen, he made his first reportage in Mexico, on Zapatism.

He developed a career as a freelance photographer, reporting from the field, in Afghanistan, Palestine, Lebanon, Sierra Leone, Kosovo… However, it is the accuracy and empathy of his approach to conflicts that distinguish his work, carried by a practice of photography that is similar to Zen Archery. Regularly published by the press (Le Monde, Libération, Le Courrier International), he was awarded the “Attention Talent” prize in 2000, the Biarritz Terre d’Images International Festival prize (France) in 2001, the World Press Photo Masterclass prize in 2004, and the Grand Prix of the Angers International Festival of Scoop and Journalism in 2006.

In counterpoint to these reports, marked by the violence of the world he is confronted with, David Sauveur has developped a more meditative personal work.

With Polaroid, whose specific color creates a subtle feeling of distance, fragility and eternity, he offers small sensitive squares where the world seems on the border of disappearance, and beauty, “suspended between the beginning and the end of time”.  In Jerusalem, he pushes this visual research further by also making reportage images with this reputedly ” non-professional ” tool. All of this work on Jerusalem, carried out over five years, challenges the conventions of the image of the city, while revealing it differently.

In 2011, shortly before the opening of Visa pour l’image, David Sauveur is the victim of a violent attack in the streets of Collioure which, after a long coma, has resulted in serious sequelae. Nevertheless, he remains totally present to his work and his history. He follows his past works which continue to be exhibited and integrated into public and private collections (CNAP, etc.)… Keeping the taste of beauty and his relationship with others.

Active filters