Jean-Christian Bourcart came to prominence in his native France for his 1992 series Infertile Madonnas, which documented life in a Frankfurt brothel. This series was later published with an introduction written by Nan Goldin. Bourcart’s training in both photography as well as psychology has been the foundation of this 2006 Prix du du Jeu de Paume winner’s photography and film work since. Bourcart’s provocative oeuvre reveals clandestine, sub-cultural worlds as well as the psychological tension of our daily reality. In Traffic (1999 - 2001) the artist’s voyeuristic lens focuses on commuters caught in the limbo of rush hour traffic, exposing the introspective and helpless state of these modern urbanites.
Bourcart’s work has been shown worldwide and are in the collection of such prominent institutions as the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Musée d’Art Moderne et Contemporain, Genève; Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Virginia; Bibliothéque Nationale, Cabinet des Estampes, Paris; and the Soros Foundation, Obala Center, Sarajevo.