Paolo PellegrinDes oiseaux

This new series by Paolo Pellegrin celebrates the eleventh title in the Des oiseaux collection. A Magnum photographer best known for his reports on political, economic and ecological upheavals, his inquisitive mind leads him to set his lens on subjects that are sometimes more contemplative, where nature plays a major role. Thus, during a stay in Japan in 2019, Paolo Pellegrin, who went to witness the cherry blossoms, was struck by the majesty and aerial ballet of a colony of black kites flying over the temple of Shimogamo, a 7th century Shinto sanctuary in the heart of a bamboo forest.

He manages to capture the movements of this colony of eagles as they fly close to his lens. Their dazzling speed is captured in tight framing: the birds seem to jump out of the frame or fly out of it at full speed. The choreography follows one another: as a soloist, in duets or in groups, these fascinating birds of prey seem to glide through space.

This book is part of the Des oiseaux collection, which celebrates, through the eyes of various artists, their immense presence in a world where they are now fragile. The ornithologist Guilhem Lesaffre has written an essay to accompany each photographic corpus. For this book, he tells us about the mythology of these birds of prey, the fascination they have exerted through the ages in the field of art, and their way of life, with a particular focus on the species of black kite photographed by Pellegrin.

Titles in the collection include: Albarrán Cabrera, Graciela Iturbide, Leila Jeffreys, Rinko Kawauchi, Michael Kenna, Yoshinori Mizutani, Byung-Hun Min, Paolo Pellegrin, Bernard Plossu, Pentti Sammallahti and Terri Weifenbach.