Les Reines du Bois : expo photo de Françoise Evenou

Bibliothèque Marguerite Durand (BMD)

It was as you entrusted me with your stories that the word queen emerged. Queen of the night, queen of the wood, queen of beauty. So I searched for a long time for a crown, symbol of dignity, and when I showed it to you, Melissa, I saw your eyes light up. You said to me: « Come back later, I want to get ready like a queen. » Les Reines du Bois is a photographic series born from Françoise Evenou's encounter with Estrella, Jessica, Melissa… They left their countries, Équateur, Pérou, Colombie, to live freely in the land of Human Rights. 5, 10, 20 years later, we find them in the Bois de Boulogne, their Nouveau Monde, because they are migrants, transgender, and have had no choice but prostitution. For 18 months, day and night, Françoise Evenou listened to them, photographed them, recorded them, and was deeply moved by their life stories. Journeys marked by suffering: awareness of their difference, family rupture, gender transition, migration, exclusion and violence. And yet dignified, these women, beautiful. Proud in humiliation. Why do people judge us when they know nothing about us? a queen of the wood, Françoise Evenou is a photographer and writer of Spanish origin. Her artistic approach combines images, interviews, sound recordings and short texts. The questioning of identity and otherness is at the heart of her research. Her series Les Reines du Bois, a book of photographs and stories published by éditions Loco, has been exhibited at the Festival du Regard, at the festival Photo Doc and at the galerie Taylor.

Source: Paris Open Data ↗