The book:

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NEW YORK IN BLACK is a rare photographic series . . . something I could never pull off again! Then I dreamed of an artwork just as rare. This book of images is larger than the average book for better enjoyment. There's no fold in the middle of photos, the paper is beautiful foil, and the cover is all black.

70 euro is expensive, but I insist on two points, that it is 42 cm tall and that this price includes 12 euros for creating suitable packaging and for postage. (France)

Minimum 40 x 30 cm, 60 pages, 30 photos. A printing on high-quality beautiful foil paper that's very firm to the touch, protected by a thick and mysterious black cover.

An unique edition of 1000 copies will be printed, signed, and numbered by me

The story:

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I'm used to working in bad weather, so I jumped on a plane to New York as soon as I heard the news

about Hurricane Sandy. After the strom, I was frankly not happy with my images (and it hadn't rained

that much in New York City).

Then a friend who told me he was living by candlelight invited me to his home on 24th Street early one evening. That's where the shock hit me - I would never have imagined the city WITHOUT lights! There was really nothing, but NOTHING! No store signs, no traffic lights, no street lamps. The entire southern part of New York had been plunged into darkness.

The streets had become ghostly, and every pedestrian silhouette was barely visible and immediately disquieting. The first night, with my imagination charged by a lifetime of movies, I honestly freaked out. But what a visual impact it had on me! (And it was also a bit of a technical challenge - I'm not used to night photography.) I came back the next day at 5 AM, and by that night, I'd finally overcome my fear, which hadn't been at all justified. (A taxi driver kept repeating to me, “It's very dangerous. It's very dangerous.”)

The only lights present in these images are the headlights of cars – and the sky, lit up by the rest of the city. The small white lines are pedestrians' flashlights, and the purple ones are the lights of the numerous police cars that were patrolling the southern tip of Manhattan. So I juggled these elements with 40-second exposures. (I tried to shoot at 3200 ISO.)

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5th Av

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Financial district

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Soho

NEW YORK in BLACK

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