Patrick Bailly-Maître-Grand French, b. 1945

Trained in physics before turning to photography in the early 1980s, Patrick Bailly-Maître-Grand (1945–) has developed a unique body of work, marked by experimentation and the creative repurposing of old techniques. He makes use of pinhole photography, photograms, and solarization to produce enigmatic and theatrical images, often imbued with humor and poetry. His work explores the materiality of the photographic medium and plays with optical illusions. He has exhibited at the Centre Pompidou, the Maison Européenne de la Photographie, and the Nicéphore Niépce Museum. His works are held in numerous collections, both in France and abroad.

Photon Strainer Series (2014)
“I don't know under what entirely fortuitous circumstances I happened to place a strainer over a lit bulb… The result was a magnificent projection of glowing dots on the opposite wall—a starlit fairy tale conjured by a simple pasta strainer! That was all it took for me to rush to Emmaüs, grab every perforated kitchen tool I could find, and marvel at the flashes of light from all these two-penny magic lanterns. Admittedly, this game is childish—but it's such a thrill to discover that beauty sometimes hides in the utterly simple.”

Careful observation reveals (a camera obscura effect) that the shape of each glowing dot is actually an image of the tungsten filament inside the bulb.