I am pleased to announce the publication of my 1st book "Giri Giri", about contemporary Japan, that extreme East seen from a quirky and somewhat "kichigai" 気違い [crazy] angle.

THE PROJECT

Giri Giri is a game of representations on the images conveyed by Japan through different societal archetypes. A series of clicks on the clichés of the "exotic" imaginary that has been built up for more than a century following the opening of the Meiji era. We meet an old yakuza who repents every day by going to the local evangelical chapter, a gambler after a malaise in a deafening pachinko game room, or the students of a posh Kyoto college during their kendo training...

"All the great fictional films tend to be documentaries, just like all great documentaries tend to be fictional. […] And when you choose one, you inevitably end up with the other at the end of the road.”

Jean-Luc Godard

These images are interspersed with texts in English / French version by Agathe Parmentier & myself. Agathe is a very imaginative writer living in Japan and regularly writing about Japanese pop culture for Japan magazines [Tempura, Pen Magazine, etc.]. She is the author of a biographical essay "Why Tokyo" (2016), a book that tells a lot about Japanese society in a light-hearted way and that made me want to ask her to collaborate with me on Giri Giri.

Beyond the unusual or aesthetic aspect of the images, there is also a real documentary ambition by placing each image in the context of Japanese society, as shown by the first two pages of captions (14 pages in all!):

PUBLICATIONS & AWARDS

This work has been extensively published in France and abroad [Geo, La Repubblica, Stern, Le Courrier International, Le Monde, China Newsweek, The Economist, La Vie, El Pais ...]. As well as presentations & interviews on important websites like Fisheye or 9lives in France & Landscape stories abroad.

This project also allowed me to win the Sony World Photography Award in 2019 as "Best photographer" in the Travel category. As well as the Special Mention of the Roger Pic Award, which was presented to me by Magdalena Herrera, former President of the World Press Photo Jury in 2018.

BOOK SPECIFICATIONS

GIRI GIRI - 103 views without mount Fuji

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