RACHELLE BUSSIÈRES
Rachelle Bussières (b. 1986, Quebec City, lives and works in New York) explores how light, time, and photographic materials shape our perception and experience of the natural world. Her work moves beyond photography's traditional role of capturing and representing the world, asking instead what might emerge when an image is formed by time, environment, and material itself. Working primarily with black-and-white silver gelatin paper, she creates camera-less works through gesture, duration, and environmental exposure. Rather than treating light as illumination, Bussières approaches it as a physical force that acts upon the paper over time.
Working in near darkness, she folds, masks, rolls, and exposes the paper to light—sometimes for seconds, sometimes for weeks. In the studio, she explores the limits of its light-sensitive surface through gesture and repetition; at other times, she exposes the paper outdoors in rivers, forests, and mountains, allowing the light and atmosphere of each place to become part of what the paper records. Only later, in a fixer bath, without the use of developer, does the final imprint become visible for the first time. Luminous blues, violets, pinks, and warm beiges emerge from the paper's chemistry, color not applied but revealed through time and exposure.
Moving between photography, works on paper, and installation, Bussières creates pieces that function less as representations of a fixed moment than as encounters with time and light. Photography becomes less a means of capturing what is in front of her and more a way of receiving what is already there. Her work invites not distance but presence, holding the tension between what can be felt and what cannot be known.
Bussières holds an MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute. Her work has been exhibited across North America and Europe, including in the United States, Canada, France, the United Kingdom, Italy, and Turkey. She has participated in international residencies including the Banff Centre, Penumbra Foundation, Headlands Center for the Arts, and Silver Art Projects. Her work has been reviewed and published in Artforum, PhotoMonitor, Le Soleil, and Lenscratch, and is held in public and private collections including the Museum of Contemporary Photography (Chicago), Arter Contemporary Art Museum (Istanbul), and the SFMOMA Archives (San Francisco). She was awarded second place in the Snider Prize from the Museum of Contemporary Photography and was longlisted for the Aperture Portfolio Prize. She is the founder of LUMIERE NYC, a platform dedicated to experimental light-based photographic practices.
SELECTED ARTWORKS
SOLO SHOWS (selection)
2025 And the sky will follow. Bigaignon, Paris, France
2025 Daydreams. L'écho des songes. Robertson Arès, Montréal, Canada
2024 Air Index. In conversation with artists Alyssa Minahan, Yyvette Hamilton, Svetlana Bailey, Armelle Tulunda, Melanie King, Yann Pocreau, et al, Equivalentbehaviour, London, UK
2023 Les rythmes circadiens. Galerie Alexandre Motulsky-Falardeau, Quebec City, Canada
2021 sipping air. Melanie Flood Projects, Portland, USA
2020 (un)objectively. Curator: Leandro Villaro, Penumbra Foundation, New York, USA
2020 In Light. Conditions of Time. Johansson Projects, Oakland, USA
2016 Strata. Robert Koch Gallery, San Francisco, USA
2015 Monument Mineral. Silver Projects, Brooklyn, USA
GROUP SHOWS (selection)
2026 Le paradigme des possibles, Bigaignon, Paris, France
2026 Imprints of Becoming: Traces, Temporalities, and the Unfixed Paradise, Westbeth, New York, NY, USA
2026 The Sun Never Saw a Shadow. Commissaire: Oğuz Karakütük, KA: Space for Visual Culture & Artistic Thinking, Ankara, Turkey
2025 Paris Photo with Bigaignon, Paris, France
2025 I Need More Time. Curator: Oğuz Karakütük, Arter Contemporary Art Museum, Istanbul, Turkey
2025 Sotto la Luce. Bigaignon x Rhinoceros, Rhinoceros Gallery, Rome, Italy
2025 Still Point. Curator: Caitlin Monachino (The Aldrich Museum), Ortega y Gasset, Brooklyn, NY, USA
2025 Enter Art Fair with Robertson Arès, Copenhagen, Danemark
2025 Elsewhere. Rivalry Projects, Buffalo, USA
2025 EXPO Chicago with Robertson Arès, Navy Pier, Chicago, USA
2025 Foire Plural with Robertson Arès, Montréal, Canada
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2024 Art Toronto with Robertson Arès, Toronto, Canada
2024 Tall Shadows in Short Order. Curator: Will Hutnick, Wassaic Project, Wassaic, NY, USA
2022 When Light Becomes Form: Processing Photography. Curator: Kevin Chen, San Francisco University, USA
2021 On Colored Shadows (with Myeongsoo Kim and Suzanna Zak). Rubber Factory, New York, USA
2020 Printed Publics, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, USA
2020 At the Edge of Both, curated by Serrah Russell & Zach Bent, Seattle Pacific University, Seattle, USA
2019 Surface Area, curated by Noah Doely, Marin Gallery, Waterloo, USA
2019 Object, Space, Action, Soil Gallery, Seattle, USA
2018 Bloomfield, Bussières, Webb, Robert Koch Gallery, San Francisco, USA
2018 Waiting for the Sun, Sim Gallery, Reykjavik, Iceland
2018 After Tomorrow, curated by Candace Huey, Consul General of France, San Francisco, USA
2017 Landscapes, curated by Allie Haeusslein, The Center for Fine Art Photography, Fort Collins, USA
2017 Beneath The Salt, curated by Marianne Bjormyr, The Culture House, Stormen, Bodø, Norway
2017 Insights, curated by Alexander Montague-Sparey, Fort Mason, San Francisco, USA
2016 I Never Learned the Song I Always Sing, curated by Brion Nuda Rosch, MSP, San Francisco, USA
2016 I’ll Tell You Later, curated by Joanna Szupinska-Myers, Headlands Center for the Arts, Sausalito, USA
2016 Fine Words Butter No Parsnips..., Present Company, New York, USA
DISTINCTIONS
2024 Concept to Realization Grant, Canada Council for the Arts
2021 Longlisted Finalist, Aperture Portfolio Prize
2021 Research-Creation Grant, Canada Council for the Arts
2019 Laureate, Penumbra Foundation Workspace Award, New York, USA
2019 Nominee, SFMOMA SECA Art Award, San Francisco, USA
2016 Laureate, Flash Forward Photographer, Magenta Foundation
2016 Charter Resident Award, Minnesota Street Project, San Francisco, USA
2015 Graduate Fellowship Award, Headlands Center for the Arts, Sausalito, USA
2015 Honorable Mention, Snider Prize, Museum of Contemporary Photography, Chicago, USA
COLLECTIONS
Arter Contemporary Art Museum (Istanbul, Turkey)
Museum of Contemporary Photography (Chicago, USA)
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art Library and Archives (San Francisco, USA)
Penumbra Foundation (New York, USA)
Corporate Collections (USA)
Private Collections (Canada, USA, France, UK, Turkey)