All rights to this photograph is reserved the photographer
Here is one photo I recently shot with my Leica M8, and which is part of a documentary series currently exhibited in Paris FestivalPhotoLevallois from Nov 20 to Dec 24 in Paris.
I was shooting on assignement for the Summer Games of the association Special Olympics in the South of France in June 2009 and took lots of photos of the mentally disabled athletes during their sporting events. But I also went to the Saturday Night dance, where the young athletes could be utterly themselves, free from efforts and the strains of competition. I mingled among them, with my unobtrusive Leica M8 and 50mm f1.4 Summilux at ISO 1250 and they accepted me and the camera, thus allowed me to photograph their humanity, emotions, vitality, joy, wonderful sense of community and empathy to each other. With this photo I would like to try to make society’s prejudiced vision of mental disability evolve.
Why I use a Leica:
For this kind of photography, I can only use Leica, not only for its compact size, viewfinder, and wonderful quality of lenses, but because the viewfinder in that case is the natural extension of my eye, and perhaps my heart, and the Leica M has a universal kind of appeal, not only for the photographer, but the people who are being photographed, even though they don’t know this camera, as was the case here. A friend of mine was shooting too, and was equipped that night only with his bulky camera and zoom, and as soon as the athletes saw that kind of camera, they started immediately “reacting” to it , seeking attention, acting foolish and disorganized, behaving as society wrongly sees them. With the Leica, they could be themselves.
Valerie Loiret is a street and documentary independant photographer working in Paris and the United States, with Leica M8. See her galleries on Flickr and on darqroom.com.
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Very nice work. Great job.
Pure emotion and beauty