Yvan Bedard

Biography

Yvan Bedard is a fine art landscape photographer. Born and living near Quebec City, Canada, he is an Emeritus Professor from Laval University, a Distinguished Engineer in the United States, and an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Canadian Geographical Society. As a former successful university researcher in geospatial data engineering, author, and international lecturer, he has received several awards. In 2014, his artistic passion dominating his scientific passion, he decided to devote himself professionally to fine art photography. Having bought his first 35mm film camera at the age of seventeen, he is a self-taught photographer who has undergone advanced training in Canada, the UK and the USA with some of the best photographers and artists. Despite his forays in watercolor and sculpture, he kept practising photography and went digital as soon as 2003 and got involved into fine art prints in 2009. Having always lived in mountainous regions or near rivers, he explored several regions in Quebec, Canada, Unites-States, Europe, and other parts of the world. His love of nature has led him to specialize in landscape photography. A permanent artist in art galleries since 2014 (Canada, USA, Australia, India), his atypical career has not prevented him from having success with his art and participating in more than forty solo and group exhibitions in Canada and other countries. He has received several photography-related honours in international competitions and has been interviewed by media in Canada, France, Japan, the UK, Russia, and the USA. His works are published in magazines and books worldwide, and they can be seen in public and private collections in nearly twenty countries.

Artist Statement

Nature stimulates my soul and my eye, and this is what I express through my photographs by revealing splendours that often go unnoticed. Through visual poetry, I want to raise human awareness of the benefit of nature and offer a respite in this era of eco-anxiety.

My vision emanates from my scientific approaches to describe geographical phenomena with computerized data. I detect details and abstractions, sharpness and ambiguity, as well as the temporality of everything I observe. Accordingly, I photograph intimate landscapes as much as grand vistas, and manifest scenes as well as mysterious ones. Trees and rock inspire me particularly, because I see them respectively as symbols of one’s lifetime and of the eternity.

My photographs are eminently subjective because aesthetics, emotion and imagination take precedence over documentary reproduction. I highlight what I perceive or imagine, without metamorphosing nature. This influences each of my steps, even when I transform the pixels of my photographs in my studio into pigments on carefully chosen fine art papers and canvas.

Being sensitive to nature and the future of our planet, I have been volunteering in environmental protection and education, as well as social issues. My photography products are designed to be eco-responsible, and I have made solo exhibitions about our environment.

Country Canada

Website https://yvanbedardphotoart.conm