Since May 7th and until June 29th, 2010, Galerie W is exhibiting a dozen photos from the series “Paris Naked” by the photographer Véronique Vial. These photos are the result of a nocturnal journey, at the limit of legality, in the city of light, with the complicity of the dancer Nathalie Pasqua.
Véronique Vial was born in Paris and traveled the world before settling in Los Angeles in 1989. His photography is said to be intimate, as each of his pictures tells a different story, sometimes an encounter. The photographer’s style is revealed in her first pictures in “A day in the life of Hollywood” where she captures the soul of Hollywood stars. She takes an amused look at famous women in the morning in “Women before 10 AM”, which will be followed by its male version, intimate portraits taken early in the morning before the public persona takes over. His series are published with international success. Véronique Vial has also exhibited at the prestigious Visa pour l’image Festival in Perpignan. His work has also been recognized with a World Press Award in 1998 and an American Photography Award.
The Gallery W is located in Rue Lepic. Created by Eric Landau in 1998, this place of discovery of art represents about twenty artists who are permanently exposed. One thousand square meters allow us to propose, in addition to the works of the permanent artists, focus and temporary exhibitions. Almost as an echo to an exhibition organized by the Bnf of another woman photographer, Galerie W has chosen to exhibit a dozen prints from her Paris Naked series which was the subject of a book “Paris Naked” published in 2009 by Editions Schirmer / Mosel.
While admiring these beautiful black and white silver prints, a song came to my mind, a little flute tune so far from his photos but which started to make sense.
Because these photos, beyond their artistic quality, speak of a love story, the story of a meeting between a young woman and her hometown, a city she can’t live without even on the other side of the Atlantic. Paris and its streets, its monuments, its bridges and its stones, Paris which wakes up slowly in the morning after having shone all night long.One day, Nathalie Pasqua asked me to photograph her” says Véronique Vial. I was very tempted, I like her slightly androgynous body, her personality. On the other hand, I had imagined photographing Paris to take it with me to California, not to leave it behind during my winter months in LA. So I had an idea: “I shoot you in Paris, naked, with high heels”. We started at 6am at the entrance of the Vavin metro station. Nathalie was going down the stairs, I was taking pictures. Too many people quickly surrounded us. We worked fast, visited Paris. At 8 am, the city became dense, we had to stop… It was intense and delicious at the same time because Nathalie never stopped inspiring me. Neither does Paris.“
Paris wakes up, it’s five o’clock….But what is really presented to us: a naked woman in Paris or naked femininity?
“The Eiffel Tower has cold feet / The Arc de Triomphe is revived / And the Obelisk is well erected / Between the night and the day
It’s five o’clock / Paris is waking up.”
Nathalie exposes her long body in all the known Parisian places through the empty streets of the crowd. But far from offering a furtive look of a simple exhibitionism, she offers her body and her femininity displayed to this city despite the cold and the dew. And this offering is sublimated by Véronique Vial’s lens, in a conversation between the nocturnal shadows of Parisian winter nights and the lights of the city, between the stone of its monuments and this so fragile flesh. The poses are lascivious but not provocative, the dancer seems to be out of time but completely in her element, in this transgression. And that’s where this whole series makes sense. Looking at the two photos taken on the Passerelle Simone de Beauvoir, never has the phrase One is not born a woman, one becomes one, been so meaningful. New image of the woman, Nathalie Pasqua is transgressive and submissive at the same time in worthy expression of the mystery of the eternal female.
“Newspapers are printed / Workers are depressed / People are getting up, they’re being bullied / It’s time for me to go to bed
It’s five o’clock / Paris is getting up / It’s five o’clock / I’m not sleepy.”
In spite of the rising day and the gradual return of life in the early morning, Véronique’s gaze remains benevolent on her model. Despite the obvious cold of the night and early morning, her photos remain alive, full of the softness of a woman’s gaze on a woman. Far from the fantasies of a Newtonian porno-chic with too perfect contrasts, Véronique Vial’s photos take a very realistic and respectful look at the woman with her shadows and her lights towards the moment she seems to prefer, in the early morning when dawn and darkness still merge. The woman in all her nakedness….
Véronique Vial, “Paris Naked”
Ten silver photographs. Baryta Cartoline print. Taken in 2008.
Exhibition from May 7, 2010
Galerie W Eric Landau
44 rue Lepic 75018 Paris
Open daily from 10:30 am to 8:00 pm
01 42 54 80 24
www.galeriew.com
Marie-Odile Radom
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