The weather has been gloomy in Paris this summer, the sun unpredictable. No sooner are you ready to go out when the sky changes.
Le temps est bien maussade à Paris cet été, le soleil imprévisible. Le temps de se mettre en route et le ciel change.

Still, the desire to be outside and the need for nature are irrepressible. Returning to Parc de Sceaux, I continue my photographic experiments: alone against a tree,
Pourtant l’envie du dehors, le besoin de nature est irrépressible. De retour au Parc de Sceaux, je continue mes expériences : seul contre un arbre,

toes fanning out (a French expression meaning total inactivity),
les doigts de pied en éventail (une expression française qui dit la totale inactivité),

involving a couple of kind tourists with their feet in the water,
impliquant un couple de gentils touristes les pieds dans l’eau,

or playing between shadows and light.
ou jouant entre ombres et lumières.

And this is Paris’s emptiest week of the year: I’ll be here to take advantage of it!
Et c’est ce week end que Paris sera le plus vide de l’année : je serai là pour en profiter!

Photos and text: VNP

France Revisited is honored to welcome the words and images of Nathalie Daguet, a French photographer living in Avignon, for a new series entitled “Seasonal Provence” to begin appearing periodically on this page beginning March 1, 2010.

“Seasonal Provence” will reveal a region that is both rooted and forever changing, a region that travels while occupying the same beloved space on the map.

Nathalie’s photographs and accompanying texts go well beyond the lavender-sunflower-olive grove clichés, however beautiful those clichés may be. Indeed, Nathalie is too well aware of the richness and subtleties of the region to get stuck on clichés. Her sensibility as a traveler and as a resident of the region won’t allow it.

Before posting the first images of “Seasonal Provence” let’s start by meeting the photographer and getting a glimpse of the varied path that led her to live in Avignon.

Self-portrait, Nathalie Daguet

Nathalie Daguet was born in Paris from two French parents but her life changed forever at the age of six when her father was posted to Singapore. Raised in a British environment, she learned English at an age when languages pour into you without effort; English became her second mother tongue and never left her. She probably caught the travel bug at the same time.

After receiving a degree in law she went to Costa Rica for a year. She then spent two years sailing half-way round the world on a 30-foot sailboat she built with her French husband. Starting from Brittany they sailed west, visiting the Canary Islands, the Caribbean and Virgin Islands, the east coast of the U.S. and the Bahamas before going through the Panama Canal and crossing the South Pacific to French Polynesia.
 
Tahiti then become home for six years, during which time Nathalie worked for Qantas, the Australian airline, and gave birth to twins. She and her husband then decided on a new adventure: buying a working barge in Belgium and sailing it down the French canals to Avignon where they settled for several years, converting the barge into a luxurious four-bedroom floating home.

The family then moved to Australia so that the kids, now three of them, would learn English the way Nathalie had, by soaking it up. In Sydney she founded her own travel agency, Voyage Australie, which specializes in French in-bound travel to Australia. All three children are now fully bilingual and true citizens of the world.

Six years later, Nathalie is back in Provence and loving it. Rediscovering her home country she has found the same spirit of adventure that she’s always found in—and brought to—her travels. France Revisited’s own well-traveled audience can now enjoy that spirit in the photos and texts that comprise the series “Seasonal Provence.”

If France Revisited’s periodic dose of “Seasonal Provence” leaves you craving for more, then visit Nathalie’s bilingual daily blog, Avignon in Photos.

Nathalie Daguet’s series “Seasonal Provence” begins on France Revisited on March 1, 2010.

France Revisited is proud to introduce readers to Va-nu-pieds, a French photographer whose work begins appearing periodically as an exclusive on our Photography & Art Blog beginning today.

Va-nu-pieds is the pseudonym—the lens name, if you will—of a photographer who has otherwise chosen to remain anonymous, unless you recognize his feet.

Here is the text that Va-nu-pieds has sent us to describe this photo project. This is the English translation of the original French version, which follows below:

I shall call myself “Va-nu-pieds” here. This common expression describes someone who literally goes barefoot (qui va nu-pieds), a vagabond, a wretch. I am neither a vagabond nor a wretch but I’ve chosen to show you my city and my region, Ile de France, with my feet. I am not a foot fetishist, but as my feet have led me to all the places that I’ve photographed for you I’ve decided to thank them by placing them in all the photos. A way of saying “I was there,” not only with my eyes. A means of making this series of photos truly personal since there is always a part of me in the picture. That creates a real technical constraint each time: I have to place myself within the frame.

In the beginning of Frederico Fellini’s film 8½ the main character has a nightmare and finds himself floating high in the sky yet attached at the ankle by a long rope held on the ground by a man on a beach, and the character ends by making fall into the sea. A very quick but very spectacular sequence shows a point-of-view shot of the hero’s foot, his ankle attached by the rope held far off on the ground by the man on the beach. We are there where our feet are.

From the opening sequence of Fellini's 8 1/2

Because this image gives me vertigo by projecting me in the place of the lens, I wanted to reproduce that feeling of intoxication by inviting you to place your step in mine.

My foot/feet is/are in the photo only to place your gaze. My feet are yours. You are positioned there where my feet are, and my gaze truly becomes your own: you fully exist in the image.

I’ve tried to translate as a photographer that exhilarating impression that I encounter in certain paintings: for one reason or another the painter seems to include my presence in the picture: I am involved and I enter into the picture.

When we don’t have our feet on the ground we are said to be in the stars, our head in the clouds. And if we aren’t placing our feet on the earth then let’s try other elements: perhaps to walk on water, on the clouds, or in fire.

Lastly, it appears that when we don’t have our feet on the ground we enter into the mystical arena…

Monuments 1, Le Musée du Louvre/The Louvre Museum. Photo: Va-nu-pieds

The Louvre Museum: One of the most touristic sites in Paris, for once deserted. Only a street-sweeping truck and a few pigeons, which aren’t in the photo. The day is just beginning on this Saturday in early September. Alone at the Louvre, an absolute luxury.

Le Musée du Louvre : Un des lieux les plus touristiques de Paris, pour une fois désert. Juste une voiture-balai et quelques pigeons qui ne sont pas dans la photo. Le jour se lève en ce samedi de début septembre. Seul au Louvre, un luxe absolu…

France Revisited présente Va-nu-pieds

Je m’appellerai ici “Va-nu-pieds”. Cette expression courante  décrit quelqu’un qui littéralement va nu-pieds, un vagabond, misérable. Je ne suis pas ni un vagabond, ni un misérable mais j’ai choisi de vous montrer ma ville Paris, et ma région l’Ile de France, avec mes pieds. Je ne suis pas un fétichiste des pieds, mais comme ils m’ont emmené sur tous les lieux que j’ai photographiés pour vous, j’ai décidé de les remercier en les mettant sur toutes les photos. Une façon de dire : « J’y étais », pas seulement avec mes yeux. Un moyen de rendre cette série de photos vraiment personnelle, puisque qu’il y a toujours une partie de moi dans la photo, ce qui engendre à chaque fois une réelle contrainte technique : je dois me mettre dans le cadre

Au tout début du film 8 1/2 de Federico Fellini, le personnage principal fait un cauchemar et se retrouve flottant haut dans le ciel mais attaché par la cheville) à une longue corde maintenue au sol par un homme sur une plage qui finit par le faire tomber dans la mer. Un plan très rapide mais très spectaculaire montre en caméra subjective le pied du héros attaché par la corde maintenue loin au sol par l’homme sur la plage. Nous sommes là où sont nos pieds.

Parce que cette image m’a donné le vertige, en me projetant à la place de l’objectif, j’ai voulu reproduire cette ivresse en vous invitant à mettre vos pas dans les miens.

Mon ou mes pied(s) sur la photo ne sont là que pour  placer votre regard. Mes pieds, ce sont les vôtres. Vous êtes posé là où sont mes pieds, et mon regard devient vraiment le vôtre : vous existez en entier dans l’image. Je cherche à traduire comme photographe cette grisante impression que je rencontre aussi comme spectateur de certains tableaux : pour une raison ou une autre, le peintre semble avoir intégré ma présence dans le tableau : je suis concerné et je rentre dans l’image.

Si on n’a pas les pieds sur terre, c’est qu’on est … dans la lune, qu’on a la tête dans les nuages ? Et si ce n’est pas sur la terre que l’on pose le pied, essayons les autres éléments: peut être marche-t-on sur l’eau? sur les nuages? ou dans le feu?

Finalement, il semble que dès que nous n’avons plus les pieds sur terre, nous entrons dans des domaines mystiques…

Jean-François Spricigo with his photo of a pigeon. Photo GLK

Jean-François Spricigo, the 2008 winner of the Prix de Photographie by the French Académie des Beaux-Arts, says that he learned photography during night walks with his dog. If so then, anima, the exhibit of his work at the Institut de France, is as personal for him as it is haunting for the viewer.

The 60 stark black-and-white images of anima show creatures that are tired, hungry, caged, vagabond, alerted, wary, hunting, approaching, moving away, holding their ground, or simply watching: a dog in a lake, a sleeping donkey, two black cats against an white sky, an owl on the ground, a canine in an empty parking lot, a wary ox, birds in flight on a hazy night, a drooling cow with an intense gaze, an overfed pigeon, two leopards reacting to something in the dark.

The background in these photos is either pitch black or vague white. And there is pronounced silence to the images even though the picture hints at noise (water, wind, a growl, flight).

(c) Jean-François Spricigo, 2009

We may find in these images glimpses of our own fatigue or hunger or wariness, but these aren’t anthropomorphic vision of the animal world.

Jean-François Spricigo

But before long we realize that what we are seeing is not that bit of us in them but rather how we are entirely like them, not as “animals” but as animated beings, or simply as beings—period. The odd inclusion of an image of weeds at night reinforces the concept that what we are seeing in anima are various forms of beings in the night. It’s no wonder then that images are alternately peaceful, amusing, and frightening.

The exhibition, running through November 21, 2009, is the endnote of the Prix d’Excellence that Mr. Spricigo was awarded in 2008. The prize includes a grant of 15,000 euros (about $22,000) allowing confirmed photographers to carry out a significant project of their choice and to be known to the public, namely through this show.

Jean-François Spricigo was born in Tournai, Belgium, in 1979, and now navigates between Paris and Brussels. He is represented in Paris by the Galerie Agathe Gaillard in the Marais.

anima is a free exhibition on display Oct. 29-Nov. 21, 2009, in the Salle Comtesse de Caen at the Institut de France, 27 quai de Conti, in the 6th arrondissement. Open Tues.-Sun. 11am-6pm. A chance to see a fascinating exhibit and the Intitute up close.

Thibault Cuisset. Photo GLK

The opening of this show on Oct. 28 was also the occasion for the Académie des Beaux-Arts to announce the winner of the 2009 prize: Thibault Cuisset. He received the honored for his project “En Campagne” (In the Country or Countryside).

Mr. Cuisset explained to the jury that in developing this project he wishes to have a eye “‘of the here and now’ without patriotism or nostalgia on our French countryside… perhaps most ordinary but still very much alive and that participates to the great diversity of landscapes that can been seen in France.” It’s a task that’s far more difficult than it may sound precisely because the French countryside is so intimately connected with patriotism and nostalgia. The result of that project will be exhibited in November 2010.

Born in Maubeuge in northern France in 1958, Thibault Cuisset now lives in the Paris suburb of Montreuil. He is represented in Paris by the Galerie les Filles du Calvaire in the Marais.

Mr. Cuisset was selected from among 200 entrants then 10 finalists. The other finalists were Lucie et Simon (a duo), Jean-Christian Bourcart, Patricia Canino, Luc Choqueur, Eric Dexheimer, Claudine Doury, Denis Rouvre, Ambroise Tézenas, Alain Turpault.

2009 finalists for the Prix de Photographie of the Académie des Beaux-Arts. Photo GLK.