Compositions

Born in Geneva in 1953, Jean-Jacques Béguin spent his youth in the calm countryside and the schools of this Swiss canton. As a teenager, it was in a boarding school on Lake Leman coast that he learned about photographic work in a darkroom and was introduced to graphic art techniques.

At 20 he began a career as a musician that would last for a little over a decade.

In 1981, Jean-Jacques founded a family, left the musical world and turned to the events business. At the same time, he resumed painting, collected orchids and became passionate about the possibilities offered by the first computers.

In 1993 he and his wife created "Jaysquare Associates", and in this context, he began a career as a graphic designer, and combining IT and graphic design he became one of the first webmasters in Switzerland.

In 2004, a few early trials convinced Jean-Jacques to pursue the use of multiple shots to compose images. Earlier use of this technique by artists such as David Hockney and Dieter Appelt encouraged him to persevere. The concept immediately interested viewers, and he sold his first "photographic series" as far away as the United States and carried out numerous commission works.

By 2006, galleries had taken interest in his work. David Samblanet of the “Phot'oeil” gallery in Fabrezan had become a friend, then Corinne Bertelot from the“ Aiguillage” in Paris, where he exhibited successively. The "Phare Sud" gallery, the "Maison des Arts" in Bages and other Languedoc cultural venues followed. From 2010, on-line sales from Paris and consignments at the Zeitgeist Gallery in Nashville (Tennessee, USA) widened scope of interest in his work.

Jean-Jacques and Pierre Eichenberger, a friend from boarding school who became a gallery owner, mounted several exhibitions at the APC gallery in Fribourg (Switzerland) and at the Galerie Schwarz in Greifswald, north of Berlin (Germany).

Jean-Jacques discontinued production of "series" works in 2012, though they continued to be exhibited in Fribourg and in France and are still commissioned.

Extensive travel from 2013 stimulated his photographic activity, trips including: Vietnam, Australia, New Caledonia, the United States, The Philippines, Haiti, Cuba, Jamaica, Ecuador, Palau, Singapore, Canada and numerous cities and deserted corners of Europe.

In 2015 he embarked on new research and composition.  His novel perspective, moving closer to abstraction, takes the form of large-format graphic creations in the manner of collages, exhibited for the first time at the Galerie Remparts in Durban (France) in 2016, subsequently in Burgundy in 2019.

With these works Jean-Jacques combines techniques specific to painting and to photography, converging with great eloquence and artistic freedom of expression.  This unique imaginative approach offers endless perspectives to the artist and the viewer both, auguring well for inspired and innovative compositions for many years to come.