Ludovic Broquereau (FR)

Interview

Paris, France

PLEASE INTRODUCE YOURSELF: WHAT IS YOUR NAME, WHERE ARE YOU FROM, WHAT DO YOU DO?

I'm Ludovic Broquereau, French, currently living in the area of Lyon, France. I'm a self-taught photographer.

WHAT IS YOUR RELATIONSHIP WITH PHOTOGRAPHY AND HOW DID YOU GET INTO IT?

I discovered photography when I was young and when my parents offered me my first camera. At that time it was only film. As everybody I took pictures of my family, friends and places where I travelled. But photography as an artistic expression really started for me around the years 2010 when I realised the powerful tool that I had in hands with my smartphone. I actively jumped into what's called mobile photography.

My approach to photography is very intuitive using my camera phone (currently an iPhone SE) as a point and shoot camera that is always in my pocket or in hands. I'm seeing mobile photography as the perfect medium to shot a continuous flow of pictures exploring the beauty of the daily life, of common places and things. I think that the mobile phone is paving the way for unprecedented opportunities in photography allowing complete freedom to capture beautiful and magic moments or scenes anytime anywhere.
My work is shaped as a visual diary composing with black & white, colors, perspectives, and the life flows running alongside. In a way I'm documenting my own peregrinations and strollings with the objective to show the richness of the world and of the mundane.

My work encompasses urban surfaces and urban scapes, street scenes, daily life circumstances, people in the streets and holidays times. The way I took photographs is also fed by all other pictures I've gathered unconsciously from other media in particular paintings, fashion magazines, indie zines and also vinyl and CD covers. And of course, photobooks are also a great source of inspiration by learning from the others.

I like also the constraints generated by the mobile with still limited capabilities compared to DSLR that push me to be both more creative and rigorous in the selection of the subject, the framing, the mix of colors. I use also the mobile for its ease to share on social media and I like the idea to have a kind of darkroom in hands that I can carry anywhere to edit and/or post process my pictures.

WHAT ARE YOU CURRENTLY WORKING ON, AND—IF THERE IS—WHAT IS YOUR NEXT PROJECT OR JOURNEY?

I'm not really working on something in particular, I've a few projects in mind that will see the light of day or not! But mobile photography is still at its early stage so I'm extremely enthusiastic to see how it will evolve! What's already sure is that mobile photography has to be fully recognized and encouraged as one of the forms of the art of photography.

THANK YOU, Ludovic.

Notes

1 Royan, France. iPhone.
2 Torino, Italy. iPhone.
3 Villeurbanne, France. iPhone.
4 Bandol, France. iPhone.
5 Bandol, France. iPhone.
6 La Défense, Paris, France. iPhone.
7 Villeurbanne, France. iPhone.
8 Villeurbanne, France. iPhone.
9 Villeurbanne, France. iPhone.
10 Courchevel, France. iPhone.
11 Paris, France. iPhone.
12 Saint Priest, France. iPhone.
13 Lyon, France. iPhone.
14 Torino, Italy. iPhone.
15 Neuville sur Saône, France. iPhone.
16 Villeurbanne, France. iPhone.
17 Villeurbanne, France. iPhone.