L'ADN Magazine - “I like to work with emotions, the idea has to move me”.

How can you make the world a better place through your art? Adobe France and l'ADN have teamed up to put this crucial question to four artists and image professionals in a series of interviews. Today, we meet photographer Emilie Möri.

A Franco-Swiss photographer based in Paris, Emilie Möri is an artist who appeals to the senses. Her minimalist compositions evoke movements, emotions, sometimes even smells and sounds. Her work is eminently poetic, first sketching drawings in her notebook, then working with models, and finally using Photoshop and Lightroom. Discover her unique, dreamlike universe.

Working with emotions

Graphic designer by profession, Emilie Möri “really” started photography in 2012, when a hand injury prevented her from carrying out her usual activities. “I began a new creative process through digital collage, on Photoshop and Lightroom, also relying on online tutorials,” she explains.

Digital collages: the word is out. Emilie Möri's photographs are much more than just images, they are real compositions, in which different visual elements are blended to bring out frank and, one might say, raw emotions. “I like to work with emotions; the idea has to transport me,” she explains. “I hate visual complexity; I like compositions that are as simplified and uncluttered as possible. The models are mostly anonymous, so that the viewer can project himself as an actor.”

Once the idea is down on her sketchbook, Emilie launches into the photo shoot(s). This is the “experimental” moment when she often plays “with movement and the body”. “I also like the feeling of a silent, shifted world... And of not being able to situate it in time,” she continues. This philosophy gives rise to series with a definite magnetism, such as Elusive or Red Stole - awarded by Behance in the photography category and Lightroom in July 2022.

Photoshop and the place of art in the technical process

After these shooting sessions, it's time to get back to work on the computer. For her compositions, Emilie Möri works with Photoshop and Lightroom, which she has been using since the beginning. “I work in Photoshop as if I were working on a real painting, i.e., I overwrite my layers when I'm finished: I don't want to have the possibility of modifying a file once it's done,” she explains. In this digital painting perspective, she explains that she works mainly with backgrounds in Photoshop and works a lot with third-party composition grids.

Her advice for getting started? “You have to do it, do it, do it on Photoshop. Practice, watch tutorials”, she explains. “But don't just think in terms of technique: it's a tool. What's important is to make an image.

Interview Benjamin Bruel