Raymond Depardon Rural

During the 1990s and 2000s, Raymond Depardon crisscrossed agricultural France with his 6 x 9 view camera. From this exploration of the rural world, he made black-and-white photographs that tell the story of the land, the people, manual labour, the isolation and fragility of small farms, but also the beauty of the French countryside.

“These men and women who lived and persisted in cultivating these desolate lands were sages, philosophers, heroes, ahead of the impending, inevitable diminution. This political and ideological shock was a driving force for my project.” Raymond Depardon

Filmmaker, photographer and international journalist, Raymond Depardon, born in 1942 in Villefranche-sur-Saône, holds a unique place in the field of the contemporary image. In 1967, he co-founded the Gamma Agency, and in 1978, he joined the Magnum Agency for whom he would carry out reports all over the world up until the beginning of the 1980s. While continuing to practice photography on a daily basis, he later turned his attention to documentary film, making use of the direct cinema genre, including the Profils paysans trilogy: L’Approche, Le Quotidien and La Vie moderne (2001-2008).