Portrait of Jean-Yves Bardin, Photographer of the winegrowers

The booksAnjou UntamedandHaikus grapesby photographer Jean-Yves Bardin have been nominated for the next edition of the Gourmands Awards and Anjou Untamed has won the Best French Book Award in the Best Special Awards Wine category. Grappes de Haikus won Best French Book in the category: Best Digital - Institutions Brochures.

These two books for photography will represent France at the "Best in the World" awards in Yantai, China in May 2017.

This is an opportunity for us to discover the work of this photographer of winegrowers who in 2015 received the "Best in the World" award for the book "Vignerons d'Anjou". Jean-Yves Bardin makes the wine culture radiate internationally and thus arouses our interest.

The man of the land and the wines

Jean-Yves Bardin lives in Angers: from there his creations seem to derive. Indeed, he is a photographer author since 2011, and since that date, he has been interested in the work of the winegrowers of Angers. His work tries to capture the "Animal" of the region that inspires him through three axes that make up a trilogy: earth-human. This trilogy thus represents the mouths of winegrowers, the fantastic bestiary of the vine stocks and the spirit of wine. The vineyard appears as a whole world, and Jean-Yves Bardin captures its authenticity through photography. In this way he takes us into the intimacy of the vines and the world of winemaking.

The photographer of the winegrowers

A first part of Jean-Yves Bardin's photographic work is the book "Vignerons d'Anjou - Gueules de vignerons" published by Anovi in 2014. It is a series of portraits celebrating the work of men and women dedicated to making wine a quality product. The idea defended is that the wine of Angevin is authentic because it is the fruit of the work and passion of its winemakers.This book has been a great success as it won the prize for the best book in the world in the category best French book.ais on wine at the 20th edition of the international "Gourmand awards" festival in Yantai, China, in 2015. The particularity of these photographs is that they pick the winemakers in action, in their work, which makes a more striking authenticity. Jean-Yves Bardin takes us into the world of wine, makes us discover the roots and the soil of Anjou.

This same deeply human concern is found in "Anjou Untamed" (Anjou sauvage, Anjour indompté) published in 2016. Here the photographer is interested in the winegrowers who work in biodynamics, in the production of organic wine or wine nature. The portrait captures the work and passion of the winemakers who defend their values within their terroirs. Indeed Anjou Untamed is made up of 48 portraits of winegrowers of Anjou and Saumur, defending a reasoned viticulture. The originality of the work is that the photographs are accompanied by an illustrated map of Maine et Loire showing the location of all the winegrowers, as well as a selection of their "favourite wines". The experience is thus made more real in a way, and the reader can thus well and truly enter this world through the work.

Jean-Yves Bardin pushes his creation a little further in 2016 with "Grappes de Haïkus". It is the first trilingual (French, English, Japanese) haikus book dedicated to the world of wine. The haikus of Annick Dandeville, Vice-President of Haïkouest, President of the Taverne aux poètes and those ofPatrick Gillet, author of Miroir de Loire (2014) and Haïku et spiritualité (2016) are illustrated by the photographer of the winegrowers. He breaks away from the practice of portraiture to offer striking landscapes that wonderfully illustrate the haikus. The celebration of this wine world is always rendered through photographs. This time Jean-Yves Bardin takes us on a journey through the vineyards.

The photographic journey

Jean-Yves Bardin's work focuses mainly on photography of the wine world. We can retrace his career through the various photographic exhibitions in which he has participated:

He starts in 2013 with the International Exhibition Terroirs d'images 2013 in Carcassonne. He then multiplies more and more prestigious exhibitions: for example he exhibits in 2015 at the gallery of the Crédit Municipal in Paris with "Du vin et des hommes" before participating and winning the first prize at the Gourmand Awards International in 2015 in Yantai. Since then he exhibits in prestigious places such as the cellars of the Louvre in Paris in 2016 for example.

Awards received

Jean-Yves Bardin is known for his work as a wine photographer, about wine.

Indeed it is celebrated in 2012 by receiving the Prix Coup de Coeur de la Bourse du Talent in the portrait category.

Then in 2013 he was awarded the professional category at the Biennale Internationale de la Photo de Vigne et du Vin.

The consecration comes in June 2015 when he receives the Best in the World award for the book "Vignerons d'Anjou", Gourmand World Cookbook Awards in Yantai, China. It is awarded in the category best French book on wine!

The Gourmand World Cookbook Award, a prestigious festival that each year awards the best books in the world on the themes of food and drink.

This year he is also nominated for the Gourmand Awards with the works Anjou Untamed and Grappes de Haïku.

Marie Lecrosnier-Wittkowsky for Les Grappes