Genesis
- 📍 Location: Passerelle Leopold-Sedar-Senghor, Paris, France
- 📅 Date: 2021
The staircase of the Leopold-Sedar-Senghor footbridge seen from directly below, with the steel girders rising on both sides and two silhouettes standing at the top against a white sky. The structure fills the entire frame; there is no horizon and no context.
Photographed from underneath, this bridge stops being a bridge and becomes pure structure: two converging lines of rivets and beams, a flight of steps, and a bright opening at the end. I centred it so the symmetry would be total, then let the two figures break it by standing off to one side.
The exposure is set for the sky, which turns every piece of metal into a black graphic element and leaves the steps as a ladder of grey. Anything more generous and the picture becomes a technical description of a footbridge, which is not what it is about.
The bridge is a single steel arch thrown between the Musee d’Orsay and the Tuileries, with a double deck so that walkers can cross at two different levels. From below, all of that engineering is visible at once.
I wanted a photograph about climbing, and about the moment two people reach the top of something and stop.
Limited-edition fine-art print from the Skywaven Studios collection, available in several sizes, papers and framing options.
