In tandem with the “Chefs Op’ en Lumière” festival in Chalon-sur-Saône, the Musée Nicéphore Niépce presents a selection of personal photographic work by the members of the Association Française des directrices et directeurs de la photographie cinématographique [AFC].

Do we really need to remind anyone that cinema comes from photography? First of all, movement had to be de-composed into fixed images, [a task duly carried out by Jules Étienne Marey and Eadweard Muybridge in the 1870’s], then a way had to be found to have the images scroll by at a pace of 24 per second to bring them to life [Louis and Auguste Lumière obliged in 1895]. In the thirties, photography spread to books, to the press, slowly taking over from text, adopting cinematographic narrative codes [sequences, expressiveness, etc.]. Stories were told through images. And while the differences between fixed and moving images will always be debated and studied, the shift to digital at the start of the 2000s seems to have reduced the amount of examination of the way the two practices differ to concentrate on what they have in common. Our visual culture no longer fixates on this opposition and the border between the two is now permeable.

By editing and organising scenes in a certain way, cinema can tell a story. A film is the result of the work of an entire crew, where each role is specific, each task outlined clearly. In addition to the screenplay, the director and the actors, technicians such as sound engineers, set decorators, prop masters, and cinematographers also play a part in creating the narrative. The term cinematographer feels neutral, but as professionals of framing and light, they are in very much charge of the image.

When the camera is off and the crew are on a break, some cinematographers return to photography. They continue to frame the world, looking at it through a lens, observing, catching the light, the colour and the atmosphere. Some tell other more personal, more solitary stories, but always using the light, initiating narratives, in pictures, like “stills from films that don’t exist” [Pascale Marin].

The exhibition will show photographic series from:
Gertrude Baillot, Céline Bozon, Sébastien Buchmann, Rémy Chevrin, Jean-Marie Dreujou, Denis Lenoir, Laurent Machuel, Pascale Marin, Claire Mathon, David Nissen, Pierre Novion and David Quesemand.

Curators: Émilie Bernard and Emmanuelle Vieillard, Musée Nicéphore Niépce

This exhibition is a co-production with the Festival Chefs Op’ en Lumière

Sponsored by Canson

All of the exhibition prints, except for Sébastien Buchmann’s work, were printed in the Musée Niépce’s laboratory on Canson Infinity paper.

For more information about the cinematographers, see the AFC website: www.afcinema.com