Photographer’s 10-Year Project Captures the Charm of Paris
Paris is perhaps the most important city in photography’s history. As the birthplace of the medium, it has long been a haven for iconic photographers. It’s no surprise, then, that contemporary documentarians continue to turn their lenses on the City of Light — Mathieu Bitton being one of the most notable, capturing its essence over the last 15 years.
Described as a visionary photographer, Bitton is well-established as one of the world’s foremost music photographers and tells PetaPixel that his new book Paris Blues — which includes pictures of famous celebrities — is like a diary of his life in the French capital.
“Paris Blues is basically an observation, looking back at my own life, having been born in Paris and attempting to re-create images and moments I grew up with,” Bitton says.
“There are common characters roaming the streets of Paris. The people might be different, but the imagery stays the same. And most of the architecture is the same as when I was a kid there. It’s also a retrospective of my commercial work in a sense mixed with my personal photography, the artists that I’ve toured with, as well friends who may have become celebrities.”
Paris Blues was shot over a period of 15 years but most of the photos were taken in the last decade. The book is split into chapters focusing on specific areas of the city or periods in its recent history. For example, there is a large chapter on the Flea Market which Bitton says he has visited every Sunday “since I was a baby in a stroller.” Lenny Kravitz, who Bitton has known since he was a teenager, also has his own chapter.
“It is purely a representation of my own life because I work with celebrities,” Bitton explains. “But I also love photographing regular people in the streets, restaurants, and other places throughout Paris. It’s all the same to me. Honestly, I just see people as people; some are more famous than others, but I photograph them all in the same way. It is two halves of my career.”
Bitton is a Leica ambassador and says his favorite setup in the Leica M11 Monochrom with a 50mm APO Summicron lens attached.
“I recently purchased a rare lens in London that I am obsessed with: a 1951 Leitz 85mm f1.5 Summarex. I cannot put that one down lately. I also love to use the Noctilux .95,” he adds.
A chapter of Paris Blues is dedicated to the 2018 World Cup when France won and “the streets erupted in chaos.” There’s a fashion chapter covering Paris Fashion Week as well as a chapter all about music.
One photo of Mick Jagger has a great story behind it: shot just before the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, Bitton went along to the Prince of Liechtenstein’s house with his friend Dave Chappelle who he was taking to meet the legendary Rolling Stone.
“It was February 29, 2020, and my dad’s pharmacist texted me in the middle of the night saying he heard there was a virus about to shut everything down and that if I was still in Paris, I should probably fly out right away or I would be stuck there for weeks, possibly months,” Bitton recalls.
“I told everyone at the party not thinking I would be causing some kind of a panic, but several people definitely were freaked out. They flew back to the States the next day and I got my stuff together. I left a couple of days later. We know the rest of the story so that was my last pre-Covid Paris photo. I don’t think we realized the insanity that was coming, but as you can see from the photo, we were having a great time.”
Paris Blues is published by teNeues and can be purchased here.
