Paris
I did not travel in Paris because that is actually where I live and where I always lived. So this travel diary is not really one but it is more a kind of a journal retracing the scenes and the moments that I meet here and there in my daily life.
For a very long time, I had the feeling that I did not know how to photograph Paris. When traveling, when I discover new places, new people and new cultures, photographing seems quite instinctive and natural to me. But in Paris, it’s very different. I live there, I work there, I walk there, and it is very likely that my eye is impacted by what it has seen too frequently. Before taking pictures, I got into the bad habit of not looking, not listening, and not seeing what was around me, as I believe a large majority of people nowadays. For me, at that time, Paris was not a photographic subject but only a place of life which was necessary for my occupations.
Being a travel and street photographer, it was very frustrating for me not to be able to photograph such a city. Even more when I remember that Paris is one of the historical capitals of photography, and that photographers from all over the world dream of being able to compose their most beautiful scenes there.
To overcome this, I had to rediscover good habits and above all, adopt a fresh look, the candid look that inspires me when I’m traveling. It took me a lot of effort at the start, and then, little by little, everything got a lot easier.
Today, I have the feeling and the chance to be constantly on a trip to Paris and to be able to immortalize all these scenes that I notice much more easily. I can tell what is happening there in my own way, and share the stories I meet through photography. Between history and actuality, tradition and modernity, architecture and urban life, gardens, terraces and transportation, everything is a pretext for taking the camera out. So you will find below the best scenes that I crossed and which testify to my humble passage, from day to day, in this magnificent and so interesting city that is Paris.
“To me, photography is an art of observation. It’s about finding something interesting in an ordinary place…I’ve found it has little to do with the things you see and everything to do with the way you see them.”
Elliott Erwitt