Jean-Louis Courtinat — It’s About All of Us

It is easy to think that illness, poverty, loneliness, old age or exclusion affect someone else. That there is an invisible boundary between them and us. The work of acclaimed French photographer Jean-Louis Courtinat refuses to recognise that boundary.

For Courtinat, a photograph is born from a relationship. He may spend weeks or months with people before raising his camera, and often remains in touch long after the photographic project has ended. He shows not only those receiving care, but also carers, medical professionals and volunteers – people whose gazes, touch and presence make visible the threads that connect us to one another.

For more than forty years, Courtinat has photographed people overlooked by society: children undergoing cancer treatment, people approaching the end of life, carers and medical professionals, people experiencing homelessness and poverty, abandoned children, prisoners and refugees. In his photographs, however, they are not diagnoses or social problems, but people in all their vulnerability, dignity, humour, longings and quiet vitality.

Comprising nearly 80 photographs, the exhibition is therefore an atlas not only of vulnerability, but also of care, closeness and human resilience. It is about all of us because vulnerability does not belong only to someone else – it is part of being human. Courtinat does not merely ask us to feel compassion for the people in his photographs; he invites us to recognise in them something of ourselves and our shared humanity. Ultimately, there is no “them” and “us” in his photographs. There is only us.

Working within the French tradition of social and humanist photography, Courtinat was Robert Doisneau’s assistant from 1987 to 1994. His work has been honoured with the Prix Niépce and the Visa d’or des Solidarités, and is held in several of France’s major photographic collections.

The French Ministry of Culture has selected the exhibition, curated by the Juhan Kuus Documentary Photo Centre, for the official programme marking the 200th anniversary of photography. It is the only event in Estonia included in this international anniversary programme.