Damien Dufresne French

Damien Dufresne is an atypical photographer whose journey began in the worlds of makeup and advertising. While these fields earned him recognition, it is through art photography that he discovered true freedom - freedom from the constraints of fashion, marketing, and imposed aesthetics.

Dufresne does not search for models in casting calls or agencies; he meets them by chance: on the street, at dinner, or during his travels. What captures his attention is never perfection but a subtle spark: a glance, a tilt of the head, an unspoken attitude. Drawn especially to introversion, he finds beauty in shyness, fragility, and authenticity.

For him, the camera is simply a tool, a means of preserving fleeting truths. He often paints the faces and bodies of his models, offering them only one restriction: not to pose. Instead, he invites them to be, to feel rather than to display, to forget the lens and the eyes of others. This act of forgetting, he says, is at the core of his work. In each session, Dufresne constructs a universe where his models transform into characters, suspended between reality and imagination. 

His earlier professions as a hairdresser and makeup artist have indelibly shaped his artistic eye, sharpening his sensitivity to faces, gestures, and the language of the body. Over the years, he has lived and worked in Paris, Seoul, Milan, New York, Tokyo, and Shanghai, before choosing to settle in Siem Reap, where he continues to create freely.