Common Ground (working title)
I am an architect and a photographer.
As an architect, I mostly worked between Paris and Rotterdam, for firms such as MVRDV, Dominique Perrault and Clément Blanchet Architecture. I've been working for a few years. I am now a project leader.
As a photographer, I have recently published my first book, developed from my very first project, called Territories. I started this project as a student.
I spent 7 years documenting buildings I was taught at school, buildings that later, my coworkers and I used as design references. I measured them to a single parameter - use. I spent years photographing buildings through people. Invoking the notion of social sustainability, I defended a simple idea: a building that is loved by a community will be maintained longer. Territories received awards and circulated between international photography and architecture festivals for a few years, such as the Sony World Photography Awards 2019, Rotterdam Photo Festival 2021, the London Festival of Architecture 2021, to mention a few. When the book came out, I was named Architectural Photographer of the Year 2023 by Architizer.
I organized most of the project by myself: the travels, the book design, even the funding through a kickstarter campaign I set up and managed. The photography stage took five years. The book design, finding a publisher and funding stage took two more. When I got to the exhibition stage, my approach had changed. I had understood something important: I don't like working alone. I seeked partners. I appreciated this last layer of the project a lot - designing an exhibition over a year, with partners who cared: spatial designer Miruna Dunu, and the team of the Atelier Néerlandais in Paris. Setting up an event, a cycle of talks. Gathering architects and photographers to talk about representation. After this long experience of seven years on a single project, the idea of working collaboratively became something of a guiding principle for me.
This proposal is practice and process-oriented. It is the follow-up to my first book, Territories (2023, Arvinius+Orfeus).
Territories was focused on use. Now, I want Common Ground to focus on craft. This new project is based on a simple idea: young architects naturally carry the notion of climate change into their practice. It doesn't represent a paradigm shift. It's a starting point. I believe there is a lot of power in such a position.
I want to study and photograph young, idealist european architects. I want to focus on the ambiguity of the architect's work process: on the one hand, the highly theoretical, conceptual approach, and on the other hand, the abrupt pragmatism of the act of construction. I want to focus on transformation, reuse, circularity. No new buildings.
So once again, I want to document space through people, but from the other side. I want to document, through the character of the young architect, the figure of the idealist. Building sustainably is hard, almost impossible. It takes dedication. It takes a lot of patience, a strong character, an ability to say no. I have a lot of respect for young people who start their career this way.
In terms of visual language, I want to work in color this time. I want to develop a language that is more versatile: I still want to use the documentary, improvisational approach I developed for Territories, but I want to couple it with portraits, details, landscapes. Hands. I want the project to feel sensitive, tactile, warm and kind.
This is a simple, and rather flexible idea. I haven't started reaching out to architects yet. I've been taking the time to consider different approaches, reading a lot, training, and mostly at this point, making lists. I want the project to be shaped by discussions with you. I envision a similar timeline as Territories, a few years of work, aiming for a book and a traveling exhibition.