Florence Charvin

Commercial Photography

Florence Charvin – Self portrait

Florence Charvin has a passion for photography, training her expert lens on just the right balance of dark and light to capture imagery that speaks to the viewer. Originally from France she made Hawke’s Bay her home at the turn of the century, making her by now an almost local. 

She took up her camera while living in London in her twenties, searching for a means to utilise her unique appreciation for the aesthetic. Florence was always fascinated by the visual as a means of storytelling, whether it be beautiful or challenging. 

Today she is one of the Bay’s most recognised commercial photographers, lending her magic lens to magazines and marketing campaigns nationwide. You might find her portraiture on book jackets, mouth watering meals styled to perfection between the pages of glossy magazines, or interiors and architectural imagery showing the best side of the Bay’s most elite properties. 

Known for her personable nature, she possesses the essential element necessary for any photographer to capture their subjects at their best – the innate ability to put clients at ease so that she might get the perfect shot with the least fuss.

A psychology graduate, Florence uses her knowledge of people to get the most from her photos. Her fascination with human behaviour leads her to delve into the why behind the who, the person behind the image, the right combination of objects to convey the concept. This is what gives her photographs their humanistic touch, their ability to tell an entire story in a single shot.

Her personal work is her passion, the way she explores the world and translates her observations in print. In the past she’s delved into intensely intimate portraiture, capturing the vibrant essence, the authentic selves of her subjects, human and animal, in their natural habitat. 

Her latest series is one close to her heart – The Swimmers Series. Florence is a daily, year round swimmer, committing herself to the ocean adjacent to Napier’s Perfume Point, bathed in seafoam and the breaking dawn. For these swimmers the ritual takes on an almost religious rhythm, which she records faithfully with her camera in the sumptuous early morning light. 

Much more than the mundane action of what is taking place, Florence is interested in why people choose to brace the waves and the icy cold water, and why they don’t. It’s a conceptual reckoning bound up in power and control, facing down or nursing fears. These are the questions posed and answered in her latest body of work, hopefully to be exhibited soon, so that we all might marvel at the stark scenes she documents with her camera. Until then you can view this rolling, growing work in progress on her website, or on her Instagram page. 

For all your photographic needs, commercial or personal, Florence Charvin is a contender whose slight stature and warm manner belies a photographic giant we should all be grateful to add to the repertoire of artists making waves in Hawke’s Bay.

Connect with Florence

Website
Instagram