Body of Light features the stunning photography of Jean-Paul Bourdier, Professor of Architecture at UC Berkeley. Bourdier's colorful images of painted bodies in a desert landscape are a combination of painting, photography, sculpture, body art, land art, performance, design, gymnastics, dance, and acrobatics.

All of Professor Bourdier's art is linked to his passion for geology, archeology and Egyptian mural art, and to his love for vernacular dwellings around the world. His first exhibited photographs were manifestations of his ephemeral earth art or his site-specific installations and sculptural works with sand, ice and biodegradable pigments (1975-2001). Since 2000, his works (none of which are digitally altered) have focused solely on body and land art. Bourdier's work has won many prizes and awards and has been exhibited widely in the U.S. and abroad. Professor Bourdier studied at the Beaux Arts School in Versailles and the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. He is the co-author of three books on traditional dwellings in West Africa: Habiter Un Monde, Drawn From African Dwellings, and African Spaces, all written with Trinh T. Minh-ha (Professor of Rhetoric and Gender & Women's Studies, UC Berkeley).

Funded in part by the College of Environmental Design, UC Berkeley.

Read Bourdier's exhibit statement in the February/March 2010 Newsletter.