Alain Laboile

La Bouée

2015

Self-taught photographer, Alain Laboile brings us through the pictures of his six children, fragments of a refuge where childhood extends as the seasons pass. While his photographic vocabulary might recall the likes of Sally Mann, the story he tells is different. Not an anthropologist nor a socio-analyst, he creates through his photographs the cosmogony of his family. Out of the accepted norm, his children embrace nature at large: their own as much as the one that surrounds them. Beyond documenting their childhood, Laboile writes a visual poem of innocence where the environment plays a full-fledged role in the narration. The rustle of dry leaves, the splashes of the water the mewing of cats, fuse with the children's bursts of laughter, shouts and whispers. Detached from the ambient anxiety, Laboile's images radiate with their intrinsic instantaneity and simplicity. While his photographic career started on the late, Alain Laboile has made a name for himself in the French photography field. Awarded the 2019 Global Peace Award for his photo book "La Dispute" published by Les Arènes, he was also granted the HiP (Youth photo book category) the same year. Additionally, the French Museum of Photography has also acknowledged his oeuvre through the addition of 32 of his prints to their collection in 2014. Alain Laboile was born in 1968 in Bordeaux, France, where he still lives and works with his wife and six children.