Baptiste de VIlle d’Avray carries us into a pastel-colored Morocco

Photographer, since 2005. Lives and works between Europe and Africa.

Baptiste de Ville d’Avray’s photography is orientated towards a cinematographic, latent and contemplative vision of the landscape and portraiture. Since 2009, he has been working on a project based on the transformations of  Mediterranean landscapes, particularly in Morocco.

His images seek to construct mini photographic fictions based on a real territory that becomes a character in its own right and on anodyne moments from daily life, by flirting with the boundaries of documentary photography and poetry. They express the contradiction between a perpetual  movement and the immobility of bodies, thus presenting an X-ray view of the inner workings of a country and its inhabitants.

About ‘L’APPARITION D’UN LOINTAIN SI PROCHE – MAROC’:

The project “So far away, yet so close” brings together 7 years of exploration on a real territory, during a boom in urban development – a place that is resolutely contemporary and yet photographed in a timeless manner.

I originally approached Morocco during regular short visits.  What attracted me, was the unique Atlantic atmosphere and its coastline spanning thousands of kilometres, between the Algerian and Mauritanian borders. This country became a character in its own right. That i revisit and chisel away at this material, honing a landscape that springs from my mind. I tryed to transform slices of life and atmospheres into stories with my camera. The characters are like silent actors, appearing to perform in a set i invent with always soft lighting.

These photographs capture a latent expectation in the air, at once calm yet full of tension, which can be found in many Mediterranean countries. Facing the sea, the witnesses wander. They pause, impassive. With their eyes turned to the future, they seem to deny themselves the right to dream.

The pastel colors that paint these images give us a feeling of tranquility, as if the atmosphere was suspended between the chaos of those cities and the silence of these open and deserted spaces.

www.baptiste-dva.fr