About

Anthony Abrieux (b. 1984, Châlons-en-Champagne) is a French artist-photographer, lighting designer, and improvisational musician. His work is composed of staged moments of life, suspended beyond time and space. Dark and intimate, his universe is governed by light, which dictates every nuance, texture, and shadow. Within these carefully constructed scenes, characters emerge with raw authenticity, revealing fragments of inner narratives that unfold in silence.

For many years, Abrieux has been deeply drawn to the fine arts, particularly Baroque, Classical, Academic, and Romantic painting. Rather than approaching photography directly, he first immersed himself in the performing arts, dedicating years to opera and theatre as a lighting designer. This long engagement with live performance shaped his visual language and his understanding of dramaturgy, rhythm, and presence.

His work has been presented on major stages and institutions, including the Théâtre des Arts in Rouen, the CDN of Alsace, and the Chapelle Royale of Versailles, and in collaboration with ensembles and companies such as L’Ensemble Correspondance, the XY Company, and the RatPack Company, L’étendue Company. Within these contexts, light was never merely functional, but a narrative and emotional force, capable of shaping space, guiding perception, and revealing the invisible.

Photography emerged later as an essential and unavoidable extension of his artistic practice. Each image is conceived as a carefully orchestrated tableau, where light, scene, and character are composed with precision. Abrieux creates personas, directs bodies and gazes, and sculpts shadow to capture a sense of suspended time. Texture, color, and contrast are refined to their most expressive state, allowing each photograph to reach a point of quiet intensity.

Entirely self-taught across disciplines, he has pursued extensive research into human perception, color science, photometry, and the physical behavior of light as it interacts with fabrics, surfaces, and human skin. This analytical foundation informs his artistic decisions, giving his images a distinctive depth and a sculptural, almost tactile presence.

Deeply inspired by painters such as Caravaggio, Gustave Doré, and William-Adolphe Bouguereau, as well as filmmakers including Stanley Kubrick, David Cronenberg, and David Lynch, Abrieux draws from a wide spectrum of visual and narrative traditions. Music also plays a central role in his creative process and shooting sessions, with influences ranging from Thom Yorke and Johann Sebastian Bach to Murcof and Björk.

Each photographic session unfolds as an intimate ritual, where sound guides emotion and movement, allowing subjects to inhabit their roles fully. Through this convergence of light, music, and performance, Abrieux creates images that invite contemplation, offering the viewer an introspective space where time seems to momentarily dissolve.

Legal Notice

*** All photographs on this website are covered by copyright. Please contact Anthony Abrieux for any personal or professional use or reproduction, to acquire reproduction rights or physical artwork. Photographs on this website are protected against counterfeiting, any use or ownership without author's agreement is prohibited as mentioned on sections L122-4 and L335-2 of French CPI and will lead to legal proceedings. Legal ownership does not allow frame modification, resizing, color or shape alterations, filters or effects modifications, nor does it allow printing in lower resolutions than original file, as well as higher resolutions and any pixel implementation. 

This is considered counterfeit and will lead to legal proceedings. 

*** Original works on this website are intended to be signed and numbered to the limit of 30 copies, acquirement requires invoice and delivery of a certificate of authenticity. All prints and frames are made before author's approval and are delivered to buyer by shipping or personally handed. 

*** Photographs on this website are also intended to be reproduced only after copyright assignment to define conditions and duration. Please contact Anthony Abrieux to establish contract.