Ariane Lopez-Huici (b. 1945) studied at the School of Fine Arts, Perugia (Italy), and at the Arts School of the Musée Nissim de Camondo in Paris. Following her art studies, she became, in 1970, the assistant of the Brazilian filmmaker Nelson Pereira dos Santos, father of Brazil's Cinema Novo. She learns lighting and photographic techniques, develops a long-term attachment to avant-garde cinema, and is attracted to all forms of artistic improvisation. In 1975, she dedicated herself to photography and did her first one-woman exhibition at Dartmouth College in 1977. In 1980, she moved and settled in New York with her husband, the sculptor Alain Kirili and in 1983 exhibited at P.S.1 MoMA and the Los Angeles Photography Center. In 2003 Lopez-Huici was named a Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres in Paris, and in 2004, she has two major retrospectives of her work at the Museum of Grenoble, France, and the IVAM in Valencia, Spain. In 2008, the New York Studio School presented a retrospective of her most recent works. Ariane Lopez-Huici continued to exhibit worldwide at venues such as the Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art at the Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, NY (2012), the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Caen (2014), Seoul Museum of Art (2016), with her most recent two artists show at SVA Flatiron Project Space (2022).
Ariane Lopez-Huici works and lives in Paris and New York.

Her work focuses on the human body, transgressing the conventional canon of beauty. Accentuating the shadowy areas of human adventure, she uses black and white photography with pronounced grain and deep blacks. Lopez-Huici's series, Aviva, Dalila, and Holly, show her passion for Rubenesque bodies. In the African series Adama & Omar and Kenekoubo Ogoïre, the artist develops her interest in a multitude of physical and sensual expressions. Her series Rebelles and Triumph deal with a group of voluptuous women asserting their majesty. Her series Priscille, 2009-2010, with a disabled model, claims in Rodin's tradition for the true beauty and personality of the fragmented body. After photographing the naked body for many years, it was an unusual challenge to work with Shani Ha, 2013-2016, and her wearable textile sculptures, Lopez-Huici's most recent work.

Connected to the vibrant world of free jazz improvisation, she records in depth many of the most talented musicians, publishing the series the flying hands of Cecil Taylor. 

 

2021

Concert without Public: Ned Rothenberg, Alain Kirili, and Ariane Lopez-Huici at White Street Studio. Video live stream courtesy of Roulette Intermedium. Listen to Alain and Ariane interview to learn more about jazz and art in New York City.

2014 

Ariane Lopez-Huici exhibits in Parcours Croisés a duo with Alain Kirili at the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Caen in France. It is the first time they show together, revealing a lifetime commitment to a shared artistic life. 

2010 

Ariane Lopez-Huici exhibits her most recent series on a disabled model Priscille, in the joint exhibition Ariane Lopez-Huici and Marilia Destot: The Fragmented Body at the French Institute-Alliance Française in New York. Guy Sorman writes the text "Free Bodies" for the exhibition catalog.

2009 

The first screening of the film The Body Close Up at the Maison Française of New York University in NY.

2008

The photographer and multimedia artist Marilia Destot makes the "photographic" film The Body Close Up. This retrospective documentary reveals the evolution and artistic challenges of Lopez-Huici's photography, from abstract to figurative art to a jubilant celebration of the body. The film mixes the artist's photography and her verbal commentary with musical quotes from writers and musicians close to her work; and shows the live and intimate creation in the studio with her models for the first time.

2007 

At the New York Studio School, the artist shows a selection of her nudes, especially her most recent group series Rebelles and Triumph, with a catalogue written by Carter Ratcliff.

2006 

Exhibits her jazz pictures at the Vision Festival, New York. 

In Paris begins Rebelles, a series of nudes in groups. 

2005 

Shows the African Wrestlers at the Bowery Poetry Club, New York. 

2004 

One-person exhibitions at the Musée de Grenoble, France, and at IVAM (Institut Valencià d’Art Modern), Spain. Carter Ratcliff and Edmund White write for the respective catalogs. 

2003 

Was named a Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres in Paris.

Travels to West Africa, photographing the African wrestlers Adama and Omar in Dakar, the Master of Ceremonies Keneboubo Ogoire in Mali, and Les Élégantes from Saint Louis du Sénégal. 

2001 

Following her series In Abstracto, she starts a series of calligraphies on Polaroid titled Attaques.

2000 

At FIAC, in Paris, Gallery Frank exhibits a collection of photographs of her favorite models: Aviva, Dalila, Mother and Son, Femme à la toilette, and a new model from New York, Bill Shannon, a paralyzed hip-hop dancer. 

1999 

First Paris exhibition on the Aviva theme at the Galerie Frank. Arthur Danto writes the catalog for this exhibition. During the show, she encounters Dalila Khatir, an important future model in her work. 

1996 

The second exhibition at the AC Project Room, New York: Aviva. This event becomes a crucial stage in Lopez-Huici's search for the transgressive body. 

1995 

To mark her fiftieth birthday and in solidarity with her models, Lopez-Huici places herself before the camera, dancing in the nude, in the 20-minute film TOAK. 

1994 

Exhibition of Solo Absolu, a series on male masturbation, at the AC Project Room Gallery. In conjunction with this show, the publication of "A Conversation Between Julia Kristeva and Ariane Lopez-Huici." 

1990 

She participates in the group show "Fragments, Parts, Wholes: The body and culture" at White Columns, New York, curated by Saul Ostrow, on the theme of the body, and where she presents the male eroticism. Following the show, the critic Jeanne Siegel writes about male sexuality seen by women artists.

1989 

Creates the series In Abstracto. 

Meets dancer Daniel D., who will model for Solo Absolu.

1984 

Travels in Italy and develops the series Corps à corps (Body to Body).

1983 

At MoMA PS1, New York exhibits a series of photographs taken in Istanbul entitled The Tombs of Suleiman the Magnificent. 

Exhibits at the Los Angeles Photography Center. 

1980 

Settles into a loft on White Street in Tribeca, New York. 

1979 

On her second trip to India, she visits and photographs the famous erotic temple of Kajuharo, creating the series Indian ecstasy.

1977 

Marries sculptor Alain Kirili. 

First one-woman exhibition at Dartmouth College (New Hampshire). 

1975 

Lopez-Huici decides to dedicate herself to photography. 

1970 

Meets and becomes assistant to Brazilian filmmaker Nelson Pereira dos Santos, widely regarded as the father of Brazil's Cinema Novo. Travels between France and Rio de Janeiro for five years. Learns lighting and photographic techniques and develops a long-term attachment to avant-garde cinema and all forms of artistic improvisation. 

1965 

Studies at the School of Fine Arts, Perugia (Italy) and at the Arts School of the Musée Nissim de Camondo in Paris. 

1945 

Ariane Lopez-Huici is born in Biarritz, France. Her father, Eugenio Lopez-Huici, is Basque-Chilean, and her mother, Evelyne Belly, is French. Her great-aunt Eugenia Huici Errazuriz is a patron of the arts, a friend of Stravinsky and Picasso, and the subject of a well-known portrait and series of drawings by Picasso.