"Smells Like Queer Spirit" at Musée des beaux-arts du Locle - an exhibition created in collaboration with Jean Paul Gaultier by third-year Bachelor Photography students, under the direction of Florence Tétier and Nicolas Coulomb (Novembre magazine).
In the 1980s Jean Paul Gaultier overturned dress codes and showed the porous boundary between masculine and feminine. The fashion designer playfully reversed roles, overturned gender and designed silhouettes that combined masculine sensitivity with feminine power. When they were launched, the brand’s perfume bottles also broke with the androgynous fashion of the 1990s. Now iconic, these served as the starting point for photographic exploration by students of the Bachelor in Photography at ECAL/University of Art and Design Lausanne. For this research project directed by Florence Tétier and Nicolas Coulomb – under the watchful eye of Claude Emmanuelle Gajan-Maull, consultant LGBTQIA+ – the photography class questioned the human body and its representations. The images created in 2021 by the 12 students relate to themes of pride and tolerance. These works show that commitment to a more inclusive society also relies on images.
A publication, co-edited by ECAL x Jean Paul Gaultier x Novembre and designed by Baptiste Gerbelot Barillon & Jean Marques, is also being published to coincide with this exhibition.
STUDENTS
Dominique Bartels
Julie Corday
Diego Fellmann
Florian Hilt
Samara Krähenbühl
Angèle Marignac-Serra
Lisa Mazenauer
Marvin Merkel
Inès Mermoud
Basil Pérot
Yolane Rais
Camille Spiller
ASSISTANTS
Matthieu Croizier
Antoine Martin
Yul Tomatala
OPENING RECEPTION
Friday 4 February at 6pm
EXHIBITION AT MBAL
From 5 February to 24 April 2022
OPENING HOURS
Mon-Sun, 11am-5pm
First Sunday of the month free
ADDRESS
Rue Marie-Anne-Calame 6, 2400 Le Locle
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BA PHOTOGRAPHY
with Maisie Cousins
The aim of this workshop, led by photographer Maisie Cousins, is to use photography as a tool to broaden our powers of observation. During the week, students explored macro photography to create miniature and abstract worlds using everyday objects and accessories. This invites us to reflect: what else are we overlooking in our immediate environment?
BA PHOTOGRAPHY
with Philippe Jarrigeon
Drawing on Moncler’s Alpine heritage, its timeless style, and its technical mastery, the ECAL Bachelor Photography students developed their own interpretation of the brand’s visual language, blending documentary photography with staged scenes, and merging reality with fiction, under the artistic direction of French photographer Philippe Jarrigeon. As part of Paris Photo 2025, the students’ work was showcased at the Moncler boutique on the Champs-Élysées.
BA PHOTOGRAPHY
with Douglas Mandry
This workshop brought together ECAL graduate artist Douglas Mandry, the Polaroid Foundation, and around thirty Bachelor Photography students. They had the exceptional opportunity to work with a camera that produces Polaroid films in a 40 × 60 cm format and weighs nearly 200 kg. This experience was made possible thanks to its operators, John Reuter and Harriet Browse, who introduced the students to the use of this unique device and the Polaroid Foundation team. Douglas Mandry provided the project’s artistic direction and supported the students in their experiments carried out directly with and on the films. The final result was presented as a collective exhibition on ECAL’s premises, revealing a particularly rich diversity of approaches and visions.
BA PHOTOGRAPHY
by Adel Debabéche
Ouled El Bahdja offers an intimate glimpse into Algerian youth, caught between waiting and the desire to leave. This project explores the mental and physical space of a generation dreaming of elsewhere, in a country where the future feels suspended. It is a portrait of a fragmented daily life, where time stretches into boredom, yet a quiet tension remains—between resignation and hope. An attempt to capture those in-between moments, those gazes turned toward Europe—a collective fantasy, a promise of recognition, but also an uncertain path... Ouled El Bahdja sheds light on a youth that, despite sociopolitical constraints, seeks to build a meaningful existence. A gesture to make visible the dreams and desires for emancipationborn in the shadows.
BA PHOTOGRAPHY
by Belinda Kiela
The images in this edition are fragments of an immersion at the University of Kinshasa : a glimpse into student life in a vibrant, ever-moving capital. Through laughter, doubts, and encounters, the photographer has learned to anchor herself in a daily life far removed from the one she knows in Europe. Bana ya Mbóka — children of the country — gives a face to the youths who study, dream, and resist on this campus. Founded in 1954, UniKin aimed to be a leading African institution, but instability slowed that vision. Despite strikes, power cuts, and limited resources, the students she has met exude strength and clarity. This project reveals moments of connection, gestures of resilience, and hopes that persists through it all.