Parcours
Parcours explores the relationship between people and places in the digital navigation era.
The project, developed In the frame of the Photaumnales festival, aims to create a collective map of the city of Clermont-de-l'Oise by relating the outward landscape to the more intimate landscape linked to the memories of its inhabitants. This series of portraits depicts each participant in a place of their choice, to which they felt connected. A wasteland, a forest, an old school, a dimly lit glimpse, assert their dignity as the protagonists of a human story. Places that are difficult to observe, especially if guiding our gaze is an itinerary calculated by an algorithm or prescribed by an application.
Unlike paper maps, which require constant eye contact with the environment, digital navigation systems are weakening, little by little, our ability to orient ourselves in unfamiliar environments: several studies show how by delegating the task of orientation to cognitive artifacts such as navigation apps, our brains stop doing the heavy lifting required to create and maintain mental maps. Instead, when we try to figure out where we are and memorize a street or a building, that place becomes ours.
Adopting this stance, people’s stories gave me access to a whole imaginary world foreign to me, which transformed completely anonymous or abandoned places into meaningful places to my eyes. Inhabitants were thus both subjects and creators of a collective emotional map based on their experiences.
Simultaneously, I introduced the practice of spontaneous walks capturing unrelated images. Embracing disorientation deliberately, these visuals collectively shape a unique narrative, filling the void in my personal depiction of the cityscape.
With time, the combination of the portraits and the images distilled from my wanderings started to be meaningful. Like a map, these fragments helped me to orient myself inside a new and fantastic version of the city, but also a very personal one and more familiar to me. It became mine.
Parcours has been on display at Photaumnales 2022 festival organized by the Diaphane photographic center Clermont-de-l'Oise in collaboration with the Photolux Festival.
![Lionel Ollivier, mayor of Clermont de l'Oise, by the drawing room of his old school College Fernel, formerly College Cassini. The building was decommissioned in 2003, but it will come back to life as a cultural hub thanks to the vision and the commitment of the major.]()
![Remy Moreau, by Ruelle du Collége. "As a child I used to pass by this small road with my grandmother to go to the park. Later, in adulthood I would pass by there by bike, then I would go there with my moped with my friends to look for cherries. Today I live in this street. I am 52 years old and I have spent most of my life in this street."]()
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![Claude Boulet, president of the Society of Archaeology and History of Clermont, at his home in Rue Général Pershing. The house contains numerous frescoes by his uncle, the painter Robert Boulet, who spent there most of his life, between 1933 and 1969: "My uncle decorated this house. He painted a lot, but he never pursued success. There are many religious subjects here and many family portraits".]()
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![Ambre Williams, fourteen years old, by l'Etang de Fay. "The first time I came here was four years ago. I used to have a lot of fun coming here with my friend Maelle. We used to fish with her dad's equipment. Once we caught three fishes. At first we kept them, but then we released them. My friend and I used to come here a lot before going to Mc Donald's because it is always nice to spend time here".]()
![Nelly Moreau, by the Chemin des Vignoble. "Chemin des Vignoble is a small path I used to walk as a child with my grandfather. He worked as a gardener for a local family and every Thursday, when there was no school, we would walk through here to get to the garden he tended. Thanks to him I started to love nature. I also love to walk and every now and then, with my group of women walkers, we pass by this path".]()
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![André Vantomme, former mayor of Clermont and former Senator of the Republic, by the Chapelle des Lardières. One of his great passions is churches. Over the years he has photographed thousands of churches around the world. "I am a nonbeliever, but for me, religion has no relationship with art. You can admire the beauty of churches without believing. When I was a child, my father and mother didn't go to church. But, I managed to make a separation between art and faith".]()
![Isabelle Trioux, librarian, by the Fitz-James footbridge. "I like this footbridge because it's the place I used to walk from Fitz-James to Clermont all the time. In Clermont there was the only library in the area and that was really the only place to go. I used to go there to do homework. And for me it was the opening to the world. I didn't know anything. In a small village the library was an important place. You had all the knowledge".]()
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![Virginie Depressoir, actress, at the Donjon in Clermont. Behind her is the cell where Louise Michel, teacher, revolutionary activist and feminist, was imprisoned in 1883. "When I learned that Louise Michel, a great revolutionary, was imprisoned here I wanted to play her role and also to try to be inspired by this place. It is a fragile building, but one that remains very strong, it is impressive. It's also a mysterious place, it's even a little scary".]()
![Guillaume Dussez, in front of his old school Notre-Dame de la Providence. "I was born in Clermont. Clermont is my heart city. I did all my nursery and primary schooling there until I was 11 years old. In the morning I stood here with my mum, waiting for the guardian to come and open the door. My parents were divorced, but they both lived nearby. I have a lot of good memories here, there are friends who hang out at the video game shop where I work that I met here 30 years ago".]()
![Léa David, at the cinema hall "Paul Lebrun" of Clermont. In 2019, Léa became director of the cinema, aged just 22. "I've been linked to this cinema since I was a child. I used to come here with my family and, later, also with friends. I built a large part of my film culture and my culture in general here. I love this place very much. When I was proposed to take over, I immediately said yes!"]()
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![Ahmed Iskou, social worker at the municipality of Clermont, in front of his house in Les Sables district. "What I like about this place is that you have the impression of being in people's living rooms. Do you see the windows around us? This is the living room of the houses around here and we are in the middle. We are outside, but at the same time we are in the living room, with the people. It's a sort of extension of these houses, but it's collective".]()
![Thibaut Bernard, by the bi-cross field in Les Sables district. "At the edge of the district there is this large bi-cross field where I used to come to ride the bike, with many other people from the district. It's a field that was partially created by the people of the neighborhood. When I was a kid I used to do bi-cross competitions all over the Oise region, but I really started here. It's the neighborhood that I grew up in".]()
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![Cheick Sine, by Les Sables district. "I've lived in this neighborhood until now. I often frequent this place. There is a lot of traffic here. The best way to see as many people as possible during the day is to stand here. I come here waiting for someone I can talk to. Or sometimes to stay quiet, to clear my head a little bit. Sometimes people ask me why I'm alone in this place. They think I'm crazy, but I'm not".]()
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![Aurore Merchez, by the former sports field of the Jeanne d'Arc secondary school: "The school was supposed to become a large car park and the sports field has completely disappeared. Today there is no physical trace of those school years, because the school is no longer there. Those were also the only years I practiced sports, because after I had some health problems and I was exempt for the rest of my schooling. So the only years I did sports at school were here".]()
![Cathy Renault, at the Chatelier Park. "The Chatelier is my whole childhood. I used to come here by bike. There were gym classes with the school. It's the place of the heart, it's a beautiful lung of oxygen in the city and it's so nice, it's pretty. When we were kids, we used to go into the water tower over there. We weren't necessarily supposed to go, but we went anyway, like all the kids".]()
The project, developed In the frame of the Photaumnales festival, aims to create a collective map of the city of Clermont-de-l'Oise by relating the outward landscape to the more intimate landscape linked to the memories of its inhabitants. This series of portraits depicts each participant in a place of their choice, to which they felt connected. A wasteland, a forest, an old school, a dimly lit glimpse, assert their dignity as the protagonists of a human story. Places that are difficult to observe, especially if guiding our gaze is an itinerary calculated by an algorithm or prescribed by an application.
Unlike paper maps, which require constant eye contact with the environment, digital navigation systems are weakening, little by little, our ability to orient ourselves in unfamiliar environments: several studies show how by delegating the task of orientation to cognitive artifacts such as navigation apps, our brains stop doing the heavy lifting required to create and maintain mental maps. Instead, when we try to figure out where we are and memorize a street or a building, that place becomes ours.
Adopting this stance, people’s stories gave me access to a whole imaginary world foreign to me, which transformed completely anonymous or abandoned places into meaningful places to my eyes. Inhabitants were thus both subjects and creators of a collective emotional map based on their experiences.
Simultaneously, I introduced the practice of spontaneous walks capturing unrelated images. Embracing disorientation deliberately, these visuals collectively shape a unique narrative, filling the void in my personal depiction of the cityscape.
With time, the combination of the portraits and the images distilled from my wanderings started to be meaningful. Like a map, these fragments helped me to orient myself inside a new and fantastic version of the city, but also a very personal one and more familiar to me. It became mine.
Parcours has been on display at Photaumnales 2022 festival organized by the Diaphane photographic center Clermont-de-l'Oise in collaboration with the Photolux Festival.
