François Xavier Richard \ Photography

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Cobscook Bay, Maine, USA

About my work

Photography is a way to set a specific time, a time when everything falls into place in the frame: shapes, light, textures. I like to catch an ambiance rather than the best landscape. This is not necessarily the subject or the landscape by itself that is important but the memory of the instant. I mainly focus on black & white for its abstraction ability, its subjectivity. A minimalism which somehow forces the viewer’s imagination.

The beauty of nature, in its monumentality, may be frightening or thrilling, dazzling or humble, but it should not leave us indifferent. What traces do we leave, what scars have we already imposed to this heritage? This wonderful nature in which we only spend a short time through a history of several billion years.

Born in 1969, I first discovered photography at the age of twelve and set up my first darkroom at fourteen. I became professional by joining a newspaper in the early nineties where I improved my photographic skills, both in the field and in the darkroom. After being a photojournalist for more than 20 years, life has brought me to move into fine art landscape photography. Fascinated by the wilderness, the great skies and the raking light of northern countries, I have been travelling since a decade to catch the atmosphere of places where the nature is still pristine. Thus, I hope I would gain a more accurate understanding of the world we live in.

To learn more about my work, you can read the following interview on the Leica Camera Blog:

« The rough and wild landscapes of northern countries ».

These pictures are made with a Leica MP, 28mm to 90mm lenses, Ilford Delta 100 and Kodak TMax 400 films. For the most recent work I use a Leica M Monochrom - the unique digital camera that takes pictures in black & white. For some series I use Hasselblad’s Flexbody and 501CM with 50mm to 150mm lenses.

After using traditional dark room process for almost 30 years, I now make my own prints with pigment inks on Hahnemühle Photo Rag® Ultra Smooth, Fine Art Baryta or Photo Rag® Baryta papers.

All photographs are available for purchase or exhibitions, please contact me for more information.

« Once you really commence to see things, then you really commence to feel things. » Edward Steichen