Christian Peter • Photographe d'art

Biography

Born on 21 January 1959, Munster, Alsace.

Christian Peter first experimented with photography, mostly with nocturnal Instamatic shots, at the age of 12. He bought his first SLR film camera at 14 to photograph wildlife in the Vosges Mountains. He resolutely refrained from using his camera for family photos, with one exception – when the patriarch commissioned an official portrait. Riding brought him in contact with wildlife but paradoxically distracted him from photography.

In 1981, Christian Peter joined the family sawmill where he worked untill it was sold in 1993. He then withdrew to the heights above Munster where he and his wife bought a former restaurant and converted it into a family home. He the turned to furniture design until 2015.

In 2021, after several unsuccessful attempts at taking up photogtaphy again, he acquired digital equipment that fully met his needs.

For the series Factory-telling he took the road for 4 years, rediscovering abandoned plants that he had known before their shutdown. This resulted in his first majot photographic series and enabled him at last to see these buildings differently, other than as production sites, definitively turning the page of his industrial past.

The landscapes that flew past on his way to these plants were a source of inspiration for the series Ci-devant l’horizon which opened up a new field of experimentation and the opportunity to pursue his personal photographic style.