In Peru, the challenging coexistence between a peasant community and a huge copper mine (2023) – Las Bambas mine, perched at 4000 meters above sea level in the Andes Mountains of Peru, is operated by the Australian-Chinese multinational company MMG. An open-pit operation employing 9000 workers daily and producing 400,000 tons of copper annually, accounting for 2% of global production. This ore is increasingly coveted, especially due to its electrical conductivity in the context of the energy transition. A significant financial windfall for the Andean country: the mining sector alone represents 11% of GDP and 57% of exports. While national elites get richer, benefits rarely trickle down to neighboring villages of extractive sites. Like many other mining projects in the country, Las Bambas has generated significant environmental degradation and social tensions with local communities. All against the backdrop of record inequalities and enduring political crisis at the national level. In the village of Chuicuni where I spent one week in November 2023, residents bear the brunt of a difficult coexistence with such a large-scale mining operation. Water stress, soil and water pollution with devastating effects on agriculture and livestock, unequal wealth distribution, internal divisions within local communities, disruption of traditional social and economic structures… The flip side of our societies’ unrestrained greed for natural resources.
The edge of the forest – The struggle of an Indigenous village in French Guiana against deforestation and the building of an electric powerplant in the Amazon (2023) – Since its inception, the “Centrale électrique de l’Ouest guyanais” (CEOG – Western French Guiana Power Plant), an innovative project combining photovoltaic panels and hydrogen energy storage, has sparkled fierce opposition from local residents. The planned construction site is right in the middle of the “living zone” of the villagers who belong to the Kali’na community, one of the six Indigenous peoples of French Guiana. Following in the footsteps of their ancestors, they engage in subsistence hunting and fishing, as well as slash-and-burn agriculture and the production of food derived from cassava. These practices promote the physical well-being of the inhabitants, strengthen the social fabric of the community and foster intergenerational transmission. The implementation of the power plant would directly threaten these activities, which account for an integral part of the Kali’na cultural identity. This should be put into perspective of the wider historical context whereby all the Indigenous cultures of French Guiana have been subjected to centuries of colonization and forced evangelization, and continue to be threatened today by the advent of modernity and globalization. Between mid-April and mid-May 2023, I lived during one month in the village to document the inhabitants’ day-to-day life, the strong links between their culture and the rainforest and their struggle against the power plant.
Just a drop in the ocean – Tale of an Atlantic crossing from a sailboat-hitchhiker (2023) – Can you think of a better means of transportation than sailing or cycling to combine passion for travelling, thirst for freedom and adventure, and environmental commitment? An invitation to soft mobility is taking shape, swimming against the tide of our societies thirsty for speed and productivity. In the meantime, you catch a glimpse of a fascinating natural environment harboring incredible biodiversity and playing a crucial role in the climate balance of our planet. Polluted oceans, just like smothered primary forests, are desperately lacking adequate protection. Aspiring to greater consistency between words and actions, it was dear to my heart to start this new journey towards Latin America by minimizing my own carbon footprint. And yet, beginner sailors like us are not fooling ourselves and remain conscious of the environmental limits of recreational sailing and of the elitist dimension of such a social practice. Not a panacea, just a drop in the ocean.
New Yorkers (2021) – I was lucky enough to spend a few days in New York City at the end of my North American journey. Numerous photographers have dreamed about this iconic city, and I was yearning to hit the streets as well. Days went by at a crazy pace as I walked for hours across Manhattan and Brooklyn. And I shot tirelessly. A passerby’s dreamy look, another one’s assertive walk, the subway workers, a reflection in a shop window, the last sunbeams illuminating the late afternoon with their warm autumn light. The moon rising over Brooklyn. At night, jazz clubs and music venues rekindled the flame that was left extinct during those two long years marked by the pandemic. In this photographic diary, monochromatic pictures stand alongside a few color images. No need to stage anything, New Yorkers go gracefully about their daily business amid the frantic rhythm of the Metropolis.
The Iron train (2019) – Mauritania, Northwest Africa’s large desert country, has only one train line. Built by the French after discovering significant iron ore deposits in the middle of the Sahara, it stretches across 700 kilometers from the mining town of Zouerate to the port of Nouadhibou on the Atlantic coast. The trains consist of over 200 carriages, totaling roughly 2.5 kilometers in length. They are among the longest and heaviest in the world. While their main purpose is to carry the iron ore from the mine to the harbour for export, numerous Mauritanians use them to travel across the country in order to trade goods or visit relatives. People who carry a great deal of luggage or who can’t afford a ticket in the only passenger car have no choice but to ride atop the ore hopper cars. The journey is free yet the travel conditions are dreadful. In the desert, the daily temperature range can be extreme. The worst, however, is not the heat or the cold but the dust. Countless particles of iron spread in the air, making it difficult to breathe or see. Inspired by the courage of these men, I made the roundtrip from Nouadhibou to Choum (about 1000km over nearly 24 hours altogether), in the hope of experiencing and documenting one hell of a ride across the desert.
Mongolia’s nomads (2018) – The nomadic lifestyle in Mongolia is falling into gradual decline. In June 2018, I lived about ten days with a Mongolian family in the province of Bulgan, 300 kilometres west of the capital Ulan-Bator. Beyond the splendid landscapes of the steppe, picturesque scenes of herders shearing the sheep or children playing outside the yurts, the family of Lamzav and Oyunaa epitomises the various transformations that the nomadic lifestyle is undergoing. The parents tend to prefer semi-nomadism to a strict nomadic life, comforts of the capital city are increasingly attracting the younger generations… My research finally led me to the suburbs of Ulan-Bator where hundreds of thousands of nomads have settled down in yurt districts because of climate change and its repercussions on the livestock. What future for the nomads of Mongolia?
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