Louise Mutrel (b. 1992) is a member of the Le Wonder artist collective in Bobigny. In 2017 she left France and lived for a year in Japan; an experience that would profoundly shape her work. Returning to Arles, she co-founded a risograph printing studio combined with an artist’s residency. Her photography focuses on vernacular images and the popular icons of subcultures, which she combines with manual printing techniques. Since 2019 she has developed a visual and narrative research around Japan’s dekotora.
Louise Mutrel
Photography
Jan. Jun. 2024
Presentation
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Louise Mutrel
Project
Dekotokami
Dekotokami is a photographic project, started in 2018 in Japan, on the theme of dekotora: lavishly decorated trucks whose aesthetic mixes references from history, folklore and popular culture. Banned from the roads in the late 1990s, dekotora drivers meet on social networks. Between 2019 and 2022, Louise Mutrel went off in search of these drivers and the gatherings they host across Japan. In July and August 2022 she went to meetings in Tokyo, Wajima, Osaka and Naha, where she documented this marginal culture and began a dialogue with its nomadic community.
At Villa Kujoyama, she intends to intensify and diversify her first experiences to produce an editorial object. Produced in collaboration with publishing house RNVP, it employs a variety of printing methods, including screen printing, risography and offset. The project is structured as three chapters: Yusuke Matsuyama’s garage in Kyoto; kyushakai women on Maishima, an artificial island in Osaka; and the car park of the American Village complex in Okinawa. Kyushakai will be the main subject of Louise Mutrel’s next project. Through contacts with these female biker gangs, symbols of freedom and sisterhood, she plans to produce texts and images that document their rituals, their relationship with their bike, and the insatiable need to be on the open road.
Crédits
Photos :
– Portrait: Julie Hrncirova
FRACB-2021-Louise-Mutrel-033 : Aurélien Mole
– Œuvres: © Louise Mutrel