Magdéleine Ferru is a photographer by trade. She explores the world for a while and return full of strong feelings, scattered, fascinating and the desire to share them.
She likes material, she likes paper, she likes multi-dimensional. She goes back to the dark room and experiments divers alternative photographic technics : cyanotype, polaroid, pinhole, caffenol… She learns basic binding technics with Marjon Mudde and at the Museum of Mariemont (Belgium). She is recipient of a grant from ADAGP to learn to make paper to use in her project. Artist books take a growing place in her art practice, mixing visual and feeling. Random and unexpected results of this technics and materials used to make her books makes her project unique. They invite the viewer to dream, to wander, to questioning also.
She learns to take time again, in the dark room or when making paper, to let the sun and the wind do their magic, be patient, let grow…
Her work is primarily in the field of photography and artist books, blending the first to all kind of plastic technics, paper, sewing, embroidering, binding, etc…
Her work has been exhibited in Europe, Japan, and United States and has integrated private and public collection in France, Germany, and the United States.
Public Collections
Tisch, SMFA Library Branch, Tufts University, Medford, MA, USA
Kunst- und Museumsbibliothek Köln, Köln, Germany
Bibliothèque municipale de Anglet, France
Bibliothèque Royale, La Haye, PAYS-BAS
Médiathèque André Malraux, Strasbourg, FRANCE
James Branch Cabell Library Special Collections and Archives, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond Virginia
Flaxman Library Special Collections, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago Illinois
Artist book permanent collection, Médiathèque du Grand Narbonne, France,
Artist book, permanent collection, Bibliothèque Municipale de Dijon, France
Valdez Museum, Valdez, USA
"Mail art" Imago Foundation for the Arts at Warren Preservation Society’s permanent collection, Warren, USA
Represented in private collection through the US and Europe
2025
Solo exhibition
"Passage, chapitre 2 " et "Soeurs de la sylve", L’Association En Avant Première, Surgères, France
Workshop :
cyanotype introduction, Surgères, France
Artist book Fair
“Sous Couverture” St Antonin Noble Val, France
2024
Jury's 1st prize for my book " Les herbes folles" at the artist book biennial, Portage, Quebec
Artist book Fair
“Sous Couverture” St Antonin Noble Val, France
Biennial artist book, Notre-Dame-du-Portage, Québec
Art In Folio, 4e Biennial artist book de Rodez, France
Salon Page(s, Paris, France
Solo exhibition
"Pukimna Passeuse d'Âmes" for The Analog Festival 2024, Librairie Books and Co, Montcuq en Quercy Blanc, France
"Bia, quand la neige est cache-misère" Fort Montauban, France
Selected
"De Moi à Soi" [Autoportrait], Le Pangolin, Marseille, France
"Psyché" Accordion book, Kalamazoo Book Arts Center, Kalamazoo, Michigan, USA
Online
"Blue Love" https://www.worldcyanotypeday.com/post/member-showcase-q1-2024
Workshop
Cyano-rello, MacVal, Contemporary Art Museum Val-de-Marne, France
2023
Artist book Fair
"Page(s" 2023, Paris
, France
"Multiples" 2023, Morlaix, France
“Sous Couverture” St Antonin Noble Val, France
Solo exhibition
"The Girl made of Light and Dust", Valdez Museum, US
Selected
"Art of the Book and Paper" Rochester Central Library, NY, USA
"Bleu comme le chat, l’oiseau et plus encore" What Dreams Are Made Of on line Challenge Book, FOBA
"Bleu comme le chat, l’oiseau et plus encore" The Blue Library, La Ricamarie, France
“Hour Twelve” (collaboration with Marjon Mudde, poem by Myrtle Marie Marmaduke), “PhotoBookWorks 2023”, Spark Gallery, Denver, Colorado, USA
“Walk to the River” Accordion book, Kalamazoo Book Arts Center, Kalamazoo, Michigan, USA
“Vie-à-Vie” (texts by Caroline Henry), CNFAP exhibition “Forest”, Paris, France
“Contact Sensible” Artist book in honor of Pierre Reverdy, Narbonne, France
Publication
1 photo in #VI of analog magazine Rûm
2022
Selected
"Pukimna Passeuse d'Âmes, diptyque" Art Biennial, Anchorage Museum, USA
“Evanescence”, Biennale artist book fair, Notre-Dame-du-Portage, Québec
Photo festival Le Havre, "Bia _Quand la neige est cache misère", Espace Claude Monet, St Adresse
2 artist books : "Passage" & "Vie~à~Vie" Délires De Livres" Gallery Écu de France, Viroflay
Publication
"Cyanotype Appropriations contemporaines" Editions Artfolage
https://www.artfolage.net/souscription
2021
Selected
Métiers d'Art et Création, "Forêt : La re[N]essencec!", Gallery La Passerelle, La Gacilly
1 photo of my series "Pukimna Passeuse d'Âmes", Houston Center for Photography
Solo exhibition
"L’eau qui court résonne dans ma tête", Expolaroid, Gallery Le Lac Gelé, Nîmes, France
Group exhibition
"Abysses", festival Photos Dans Lerpt, St Genest de Lerpt, France
2020
Selected
"Abysses", Parcours Phot’Aix, Aix-en-Provence, France
2019
Group exhibition
Polaroid Festival 2019, "Wall Of Fame", ATELIER GUELL, Barcelona, Spain
"Sans Altre Mue" La Fontaine Obscure at La Grande Vitrine, Arles, France
"Mush!" (Chambre07) Gallery Le Lac Gelé, Nîmes, France
"Sans Altre Mue", Festival Photos dans Lerpt, St Genest Lerpt, France
Solo exhibition
"Mush!", Centre Léon Bérard, Lyon, France
2017
Honorable mention
Boundaries, L.A. Photo Curator
IPA -Int'l Photography Awards-
Q2 Art Competition, Artist Portfolio Magazine, for "Glacier Art, Hands"
Group exhibition
People & Winter, Blank Wall Gallery, Athens, Greece
Travel, Blank Wall Gallery, Athens, Greece
My books "Kennecott" and "Rest In Pieces", festival "La photo se Livre", Galerie Fontaine Obscure Aix-en-Provence, France
3rd International Arvest Expo, Yerevan, Armenia
Moments of Color, Blank Wall Gallery, Athens - Greece
My book "Kennecott" photo show RDVI, Strasbourg, france
2016
Group exhibition
PhotoPassion booth, Salon de la Photo, Paris, France
Solo exhibition
"Inside Kennecott", Numériphot, Toulouse, France
Honorable mention
IPA -Int'l Photography Awards-
MIFA -Moscow International Foto Awards-
2015
Group exhibition
PhotoPassion booth, Salon de la Photo, Paris, France
First prize "Landscape along the Dordogne River From Bort-les-Orgues to Argentat", smartphone category, France
Honorable mention
Best of Photography Contest ~ Concours, sponsored by SIGMA Photographer's forum, Serbin communications
2009
Solo exhibition
"Tokyo dans mon Keitai", -Under the patronage of the French Ambassy-
Lovers Rock Cafe, Tokyo, Japan
First prize and public choice "L'automne à Lafrancaise", France
