Olivier Lavenac

HEIRS

The force and violence with which these teenagers are seized by the intensity of life deeply move me. When I photograph them, paintings sometimes come to mind — they remind me of old figures from the Italian or Flemish Renaissance, periods I’m particularly drawn to. Other times, they remind me of plays: they seem to constantly embody characters that inhabit our culture — except they are real: not acting, but living. The idea of Heirs came to me with the image of Shakespeare’s statue, casually crowned with a cap for a new era by Moussa and his friends. I read it as an inverted legacy, where the new generations offer the old ones the keys to their universe. Their presence is sometimes like a dream, and this dream tells the story of a child who already sees themselves as an adult. But this passage, like time itself, which transforms their world, their body, and their gaze, can also have a darker side, filled with fears, doubts, and vulnerability. From streets to museums, the promises of this universe and the contrasts it brings into play fascinate me. These passages — between the African, Caribbean, or Oceanian roots of these young people and the Western world to which they are now giving a new face; between worlds that too rarely communicate — have, when they exist, something magical, mysterious, and simply beautiful.