Barricades 2024 is pleased to announce Jean Baptiste Hugo as one of our Guests of Honor for this year’s convention. Jean Baptiste Hugo is the great-great-grandson of Victor Hugo. He has extensively photographed Hugo’s home in exile on Guernsey, a project about which he said this: “In 2014, I was about to start a series of photographs of Hauteville House, where Victor Hugo stayed in exile for 15 years. I had the intention, picturing in my mind the dark gothic rooms, to use the legendary black and white 400 Tri-X Kodak film, known for its grainy quality and its rich black tones. It just happened that around that same period I started looking into the extraordinary colour possibilities offered by digital photography, having considered it for years , I must admit, as very inferior to black and white film. The introduction I was given to digital colour photography inspired me enough to try and capture as faithfully as I could the colourful atmosphere of my ancestor’s folly on Guernsey and, I am glad I did, as it allowed me to engage in an exploration of colour and texture in a very creative way which I am still pursuing today through other photographic subjects.”
