I’ve been a professional photographer for six years. I’m completely satisfied with my work and what it brings me, thanks to my fantastic clients. But I’m always looking to improve, to experiment, to discover new processes, new ways of doing photography. I’m trying to open myself up to new things that might come in handy later on. That’s how I started doing architectural photography, landscapes, portraits, perfecting my retouching skills…always with the aim of doing things I’m not used to or in a new way. Re-learning photography through more personal projects, not being constantly on assignment, offering something different on my own initiative.

But it’s in street photography that I’ve really found something that I thrive in.  More than a process or a technique, it’s a way for me to discover places and meet people I would never have met otherwise. And from a practical point of view, I can do it anywhere, anytime. It’s an excuse to wander, to let yourself be carried along by the rhythm of the street, to surf the city’s low lights, or to be captured by a passing glance or a shared smile.

As I’m also a geographer, street photography allows me to link the two parts of my activities. For me, it’s not just about taking pictures of people, focusing only on their faces or bodies. Of course, my main subject is people. But above all it’s about showing how people interact with each other and with the spaces they occupy and live in. My aim is to talk more about societies than about people themselves, to show particular ways of living in particular spaces. To take a step back by showing the local context.

All these reasons have led me to prefer candid photography: focusing on scenes, light and reactions rather than on posed, expected photos. I react to the scenes that are happening in front of me or I choose a place with a particular light or setting and wait for something to happen. In the end, I rarely shoot with the camera in front of my eyes, often preferring to shoot from the hip or with the camera in my hand.

I like to play with light and shadow, hiding certain parts of the scene and faces rather than showing everything. I like to play with light and shadow to stimulate the imagination and add dramatic effect, to allow people to see and interpret, rather than to show everything, which might ruin the purpose. For me, it’s the meaning of the image that counts, the story it tells, rather than necessarily showing every detail. The aim is always the same: to isolate the subject, playing with light/shadow, sharpness/blurriness, contrasts, etc. The idea is not to show what our eyes see. Photography is essentially a filter, driven by the photographer’s interpretation.

I started this project in February this year with my friend Romain Cruse. The idea was to discover a culture that was completely different from what we knew, and at the same time to adopt shooting techniques that corresponded to the style of images we wanted to make. We didn’t travel much, staying mainly between Tokyo, Kyoto and Osaka, with a few forays into the suburbs. Street photography isn’t easy, so we wanted to concentrate on certain places, especially certain cities, so as not to get lost in the materiality of our travels and the slow, laborious process of rediscovering new spaces.

In three weeks I’ve only scratched the surface of this space, and yet I was immediately aware of a particular aesthetic specific to the country. The lights, the reflections, the shadows – everything seems to have been designed to create a visible, tangible atmosphere, a graphic design. On the other hand, there are many permanent contrasts, such as the juxtaposition of the oldest with the newest, the smallest with the largest, and so on. It’s an accumulation of contrasts that is absolutely fantastic for any street photographer.

Havana came later, almost spontaneously. Romain and I were delighted with our trip to Japan and the techniques we’d developed in street photography. We wanted to continue this project, but in a completely different place. Cuba seemed to us to be the exact opposite of Japan in terms of geography (apart from the fact that they are both islands), history and culture. And with the same goal in mind, we stayed in Havana and the surrounding area to avoid spending too much time in traffic, which can be unpredictable. Here the streets are narrow and the sun doesn’t shine in for long. The exercise is really different and you really have to look hard not to repeat what you have seen a thousand times and try to keep things interesting. Having mastered the technique I wanted to use for this project, I was able to immerse myself more quickly in the atmosphere, find places to wait and where to wander, find the right lighting, meet people, etc. to capture the stories I wanted to tell, while continuing to perfect my skills.

In the end, these two different experiences taught me to find a balance between technique and subject, to concentrate on the quality of the light, to behave like a street photographer and, of course, to experiment. I don’t know where my next trip will take me, but I’ll definitely be practising on the streets of my hometown, Lyon!