maxime ballesteros was born in 1984 in Lyon, France. after studying in ERBASE (fine art school of St Etienne), maxime graduated in 2007 with a DNSEP(master diploma of art) in graphic design and photography. he has participated in several group exibitions in France, Belgium and in Berlin, where he has been based since October 2007.
maxime’s photography could be seen as a necessary daily act. he records his own entourage and intimate surroundings: the everyday cold beauty and fat violence. he is constructing a collection or reserve, of comforting places and faces, fake and shy and twisted glances, erection-making moment. drunken behavior and graceful fates. trying to get closer. he relies on photography’s potential to make things understandable, evident.working mostly in black and white, with manuals cameras and prime lenses, MB believes in the necessity of understanding the camera and the photographic process. eschewing ‘intellectual’ photography, he puts his trust in the camera, in its imagination. he thinks in term of framing, grain, atmosphere or legibility over meaning. taking pictures becomes a pretext or impetus for travel, which implies a way of looking and of moving. a way of being in the world: available.‘’a means of exploration and travel [...] as a car or a plane. the photo camera makes arrival in a place possible. ‘’ Wim Wenders.
MB has been influenced strongly by inescapable older photographers, like Bresson, Avedon, Klein or Newton.
