FRAGMENTS
«I was born on April 10th 1973, and grew up in the suburb of Nantes, France. I work in an architectural firm during the day, and take pictures at night (or the weekend). The majority of my subjects are urban spaces built without an architect and places built more for cars than for people. I studied architecture from 1992 to 2000 using photography as an analytic tool and a way to explore urban spaces. I studied in particular the evolution of the townscape along radial roads that allow us going through the city from its suburb to its center, in the style of a geologist who would study the evolution of the earth from cutting through a rock. The different manners to build the city between yesterday and today are revealed along radial roads. The history of the city scrolls along this ribbon of asphalt. I am interested in the various ways of watching the city. A city could be understood from its network of streets that creates the driver when going on his way, appreciated for its structure when a tourist admires its craft or it can be seen through shop windows, etc… Photography allows stacking these several layers showing only elements that are not generally seen at the same time (as a cathedral and a road sign, which are nevertheless part of the same city).
My purpose is to capture on film the city that is constructed now. It could be in the city center where it builds on itself permanently or in the suburbs. I am particularly interested in interstitial spaces made by urban sprawl and gaps between areas dedicated to mobility. In the periphery, the urban codes have radically been changed during some decades. Cities underwent an unprecedented urban expansion (which did not stop increasing) since the 50s because of the common use of the automobile.
The suburban landscape is strongly marked by the overlapping of dimensions that I photograph. The suburbs’ carriageway is like a thread traveling through real territories that are inhabited connecting them, but simultaneously forming terrible unbridgeable barriers. Different neighborhoods have never been so close as a large territory and yet so isolated at the same time. My purpose is not to bring to light the aberrations of current urban planning, but to reveal atmospheres.»
Text edit by Bruno Zhu.
© All copyright remains with photographer Benoît Chailleux