MARC LAGRANGE: by Echo Fine Arts

10 December 2020 - 31 January 2021

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From December 10th, 2020 until January 31st, 2021, Echo Fine Arts is pleased to present its first online show featuring the work of renowned Belgian photographer Marc Lagrange (1957-2015). Five years after his passing, “Marc Lagrange by Echo Fine Arts” aims to honor the memory of this iconic figure of the early XXIst century photography.
"My settings are places for dreams,
for the imaginary to prevail."

Marc Lagrange
Taking a distinctive approach to the nude genre, Marc Lagrange meticulously composed timeless images - with each location and prop carefully chosen to enhance the subdued and revealing mood. This ambivalence sparks a sense of mystery which acts like an Ariadne thread throughout his body of work.
Articulated around four of his favoured techniques (Platinum-Palladium, Chocolate Polaroid, gelatin-silver print and large format archival pigment prints), this exhibition offers the viewer a retrospective journey through of his extensive career, from the glamour sets of Diamonds & Pearls to the sculptural simplicity of Senza Parole.
Artworks
Large Format Studio Portraits
Maybe Someday, 2000
Building trust and chemistry with his models through time, he has defined the outline of a new type of feminine portraiture. Not submissive nor dominating, his models dare to gaze at the viewer right in the eye with outstanding self-assurance denuded from defiance. Lagrange has hence redefined the nude genre where the naked one is not necessarily the one we first think of.
Artworks
Chocolate Collection
Capricorn, 2011
Marc Lagrange absolutely loved the Polaroid 100 Chocolate film, a limited and very rare edition that only landed in a few select hands. Its unique process is quite different from other Polaroid films. The Chocolate Polaroid was a perfect fit for his black and white aesthetics. While highlighting his trademark ethereal outlines, its warm chocolate brown shadows and creamy highlights enhanced the intimacy of each shot. Each portraits turns into an emotional and timeless painting.
Artworks
Senza Parole
Delvaux' Dream, 2014
His final body of work, Senza Parole, can be viewed as a “parting gift”. Meditative and silent, it offers a more introspective approach to the nude genre. Fascinated with classic sculpture, Lagrange travelled Pietrasanta, Italy, to infuse his creative mind with codes of Italian aesthetic. Back home, the Handelsbeurs in Antwerp showed itself as an irresistible temptation to the artist, an architectural marvel if ever there was one. Borrowing postures from mannerism, he applied a dramatic chiaroscuro to his subject to enhance their monumental presence. Sensually melancholic, Senza Parole has carved Lagrange’s photographic style into posterity.
Artworks
Platinum Collection
Tusk, 2015
Revisiting Lagrange’s most iconic photos, the Platinum Collection offers a more intimate alternative to his larger Diasec formats. Also called “platinotypes”, these are photographic prints made by a monochrome printing process that provides the large & delicate tone range from warm black, to reddish brown, to expanded mid-tone grays. Being hand-coated, each print offers a unique result. The pigment being absorbed inside the paper, the reflective quality of the print is diffuse, and the absence of gelatin prevents any tendency to curl. Platinum prints are therefore considered as the most durable of all Photographic processes.
- Marc Lagrange
  Tsarina VIII, 2007