Dreamy Series of Flying Houses in France

Surrealism is alive and well. Perhaps it’s a product of the often dismal state of the world, and our need to escape. Or maybe it’s just human nature to bring musings of the unconscious mind to life through art. We suspect it’s a bit of both. And the work of French artist Laurent Chéhère is a prime example. There is something inherently charming about his Flying Houses series. Chéhère manipulates photographs of a wide variety of dwellings to appear as if they are floating around in a dream-like world. These fantastical compositions are layered in details and nuances, and we credit Chéhère’s vivid imagination and masterful skills. These works are almost cinema-like, easily translating into moving images in our minds. In his own words, Chéhère explains how he “isolates these buildings of their urban context and releases them from the anonymity of the street to tell the life, the dreams and the hopes of these inhabitants. Technically, it’s a photomontage.” After a sketch, he “photographs hundreds of elements: roof, windows, gutter, fireplace, characters, antennas, graffiti and sky, then assembles everything with a digital retouch software on his computer. In gallery, the images are shown in large format and let the curious observer to discover details and hidden references of these accurate reconstructions by proposing a double reading, one by far and one closely.”

Via laurentchehere.com