Inside the big Olympic Stadium of Phnom Penh, young Cambodians follow the rehearsal of an historical play: the reconstruction of the Khmers’ genocide that marked forever the country’s history. I was in Phnom Penh during the photo festival. For days, I was looking for an angle on how to shoot this Olympic Stadium: a symbolic place built in 1963 for the South-East Asian Olympics, which were cancelled due to the political troubles occurring in the country. De Gaulle gave his famous 1966’s Phnom Penh address in this stadium that later became an execution centre for Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge regime. The Trauma and recklessness of this dark period of Cambodian history are difficult to measure....

In Africa, disability doesn’t stand up to tradition « It is all about tradi-disability and social pressure to preserve the group’s ethnicity. All the children I took a picture of have been excluded because they bear this taboo, this difference own to their disability or twinship. These children don’t know who they are. There is no psychological monitoring. Big NGOs go to warring countries but forget developing countries… How can it be possible ? Nothing allows us to think that any african population could be so powerless in the face of this problem. Traditions alone can decide for the fate of an illegitimate child, a unblessed child…So they are abandonned, and this is a real...

Barcelona is at the beginning of my new work titled « Entrada, » where I follow the journey of my father when he traveled from Morocco and through Europe in 1970. His passport notes his passage through Barcelona, Brême, Dortmund, and Rotterdam, before arriving in France. I am interested by the idea of mixing areas and towns to recreate one as a legend. Observing this way by which migrants are regarded at the center of our society has allowed me to blend into the natural mobility of the European social lanscape. If the idea of Europe does not really exist, the concept of immigration becomes once again blurred. Who are the foreigners ? Are they simply residents who lack the nationality of...

Any displaced community will, one day, wonder about its identity. The first students from Laos arrived in France in the late 60’s and saw the refugees turning up in1974. Those refugees were fleeing communism and discovering the “free world”. These Asian migrations are often compared with the “boat people”, and the Laotians were among the migration waves France organised. Hence, we can understand their feeling of owing to France for taking them out of the camps. They had to integrate quickly into the modern world while keeping their Buddhist rituals. Today, they are a visible minority. Few documents exist about these people from Southeast Asia who migrated to France. The sociologists P....

As asked by the Laotian community of Orleans, who wanted to illustrate the trip, and with the Secours Populaire as a partner, I followed the changes of these 20 teenagers during the summer of 2009 in their journey to Laos. Aware of the problems linked to the passing on of the parent’s culture, I tried to draw a portrait of the young Laotian generation born in France, through a unique and emotional trip, conditioned by the hope of meeting their origins. How can I photograph and transcribe their hope to create links with a country their parents fled 30 years before? The strength of this illustrated report is equivalent to the strength these young people spread out to realize their dream....

One day, I've shown to my father some of my pictures : his mother's grave and the portrait of his sisters in Rabat. He simply answered : "I understand". I heard it as a proof of love. The pictures were taking him back to his country. The migration made him keep a social link between his native country and abroad. Whereas my father refused to go back to Morocco, the family story made the son do it. My job was to create the link again. Obviously I wanted to work on memory, places, feelings, complexity of the separation with the country, and the way everyone would live the emotional link with the family. I had to take over the simple note of an official story of migration to deal with the...

One day, I've shown to my father some of my pictures : his mother's grave and the portrait of his sisters in Rabat. He simply answered : "I understand". I heard it as a proof of love. The pictures were taking him back to his country. The migration made him keep a social link between his native country and abroad. Whereas my father refused to go back to Morocco, the family story made the son do it. My job was to create the link again. Obviously I wanted to work on memory, places, feelings, complexity of the separation with the country, and the way everyone would live the emotional link with the family. I had to take over the simple note of an official story of migration to deal with the...

One day, I've shown to my father some of my pictures : his mother's grave and the portrait of his sisters in Rabat. He simply answered : "I understand". I heard it as a proof of love. The pictures were taking him back to his country. The migration made him keep a social link between his native country and abroad. Whereas my father refused to go back to Morocco, the family story made the son do it. My job was to create the link again. Obviously I wanted to work on memory, places, feelings, complexity of the separation with the country, and the way everyone would live the emotional link with the family. I had to take over the simple note of an official story of migration to deal with the...

My first illustrated report, following Pierre Verger’s path. A race forward, a search for the African nature. In this early 21st century, the Benin commemorates the story of the deportation of slaves. This bitter memory imposed a huge respect when I took part in the official ceremonies at the voodoo master Dagbo Houno’s. Benin, former Dahomey, country that came back from exile; when the snake bites, you do not get away. Alive, I returned in the evening, cured from that deadly venom. Here it is, I’m seen differently, I came back from the dead… I will write those few words to my father: “you know, it is beautiful here, it reminds me of your place.” I was 25; this report is my pride as a...