R E A D E R S
On Saturdays, I approached readers in Parc Georges-Brassens and le Jardin du Luxembourg. After each portrait, we would have a conversation. Sometimes we’d talk for a long time. We talked about reading, photography, public life, ourselves and each other. Their stories made my own more meaningful, and less important. We were all just parts of the city.
At the end of our conversations I would leave the readers to continue their solitary public acts, while I went to find a place apart for my own private exercise: making notes after each encounter. I thought of these accounts of short term memory as retrospective verbatim. I made my chronicles, linking them to the book titles that would become the titles of their corresponding photographs. Some of the juxtapositions between the titles and the images I named after them felt destined. One of my favourites was an autobiographical inquiry into political apathy, read by a young man sitting alone in a circle of empty chairs... His book was called: “La campagne Présidentielle n’a pas eu lieu” (The Presidential Campaign did not take place.)
Between 2007-2008, EB made over 70 portraits of readers, some of which are shown here.
All images © Erin Brubacher