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The Comédie-Française, on and off stage
Jean-Louis Fernandez
Watch the meeting with Jean-Louis Fernandez, moderated by Vincent Jolly https://cloud.imagesevidence.com/index.php/s/npdf5eSgg32Cgm8
Jean-Louis Fernandez was the guest of the troupe of the Comédie-Française for a period of one year, invited to photograph the troupe and the wide range of work, rehearsals, performances and tours. He has presented a report covering a dozen or so different productions, capturing them live, at the very moment, or rather diverse moments, of the troupe’s existence as it has continued over the centuries, since 1680, and still does in its day-to-day work.
Is it the special grain of the black and white prints? Or the accurate focus? Is it the contrast and textures captured as if in relief (indeed, each and every contrast backstage in a theater, or on a face, or seen on an actor’s skin as reflected in a mirror)? Is it the moment chosen, the single moment, framed and set apart in the course of time? Is it the understanding of an original situation, unprecedented, within an operational situation (a rehearsal, a moment in the green room, make-up and so on)? I am unable to analyze the cause and effect of the instant immediate emotional response to photos taken by Jean-Louis Fernandez, nor the feeling, or the certainty, that there is a presence, a tangent as sharp as for love, where feeling and certainty are strangely compatible, presenting a truth on theater, on drama, and not just for our Comédie-Française.