Didier Ben Loulou

Didier Ben Loulou travelled extensively along the Mediterranean coast, to cities and landscapes, in search of the meaning of wandering. From 2006 to 2008, he photographed gypsies mingling with migrants in Athens, merger of the Third and the Fourth Worlds on the outskirts of the capital. From 2006 to 2019, he finalized a project on Corsica, Sanguinaires, quintessence according to him of the Mediterranean. He examined the notion of re- enchantment and the possibility of happiness in a chaotic world: "I simply want to be the bearer of what is revealed to me, silently and in secret". Since then, Didier Ben Loulou has been leading a nomadic existence between Jerusalem, Marseille, Jaffa, Athens, Tanger, Palermo, Safed, Thessaloniki and Ajaccio.

In the next two decades, Didier Ben Loulou undertook a vast photographic project on towns and cities, a collection of portraits under the format of a “photographic repertoire” of urban geographies. In the ancient and historical port of Jaffa and the Ajami Neighbourhood, he observed the comings and goings of populations, their exile and asylum. His focus moved to Jerusalem between the two Intifadas (1991-2008), cornerstone of his work, where he explored the meanders of a city with multiple borders, filled with violence and the sacred. A book, Jérusalem: 1991-2006, was published in 2008.

In the 1990s, Didier Ben Loulou attended a series of seminars in philosophy at the Institute d’Etudes Lévinassiennes in Jerusalem, conducted by Benny Levy.

The square format and colours are all-important features of his work, as well as the Fresson process used to print his analogue images since 1979. He is a Villa Medici Hors les Murs laureate (1995) and the recipient of a Fiacre (French Ministry of Culture) scholarship (1997). Didier Ben Loulou is the author of about twenty books, including three journals and reflections on his approach, Chroniques de Jérusalem et d’ailleurs (2016), Un Hiver en Galilée (2018), Mise au Point with Fabien Ribery (2019) and Une année de Solitude (2020). His works are regularly exhibited in Europe and the United States. The Institute for Contemporary Publishing Archives (IMEC) is the repository of his private archives since 2007. Un Hiver en Galilée (2018), and Mise au Point with Fabien Ribery (2019).

Didier Ben Loulou (born 29 May 1958), is a Franco-Israeli photographer.

Didier Ben Loulou was born on 29 May 1958, in Paris, France. He studied art history and photography before moving to Israel in 1981, where he volunteered on Kibbutz Ma’agan Michael. He took up photography, working on a first project, Israel Eighties, a series of images in black and white. In 1983, he was admitted to the Mayanot Institute for Jewish Studies in Jerusalem, to study under Rabbi Leon Ashkhenazi (Manitou).