The Roger-Viollet Gallery is presenting a major retrospective dedicated to Gaston Paris, a French photographer who has been long overlooked despite his prolific career and lasting influence on modern photography. Titled "The Balance of the Square," the exhibition features 58 black and white prints that highlight his systematic use of the square format and the geometric rigor of his vision, while revealing his ability to combine formal precision with visual poetry.
This retrospective is part of the 14th edition of the Photo Saint-Germain festival (November 6-30, 2025) and continues the rediscovery of the artist initiated by historian Michel Frizot. Frizot emphasizes Paris's unique abilities, stating: "Gaston Paris is a virtuoso of difficult lighting conditions, insufficient or overly contrasted light, and backlighting. He knows where to position himself in space to provide the most impressive view, which is not that of the ordinary spectator. His photography becomes a spectacle in itself, a substitute spectacle made available to all viewers."
Trained in journalism and active from the 1930s, Paris collaborated with iconic publications such as Vu, where he was the sole staff photographer, as well as Regards and Art et Médecine. As a member of the group "Le Rectangle," alongside Pierre Jahan and Emmanuel Sougez, he developed a distinctive photographic language where rigorous composition and formal boldness transformed each image into an aesthetic and intellectual experience.
Paris's work oscillated between social reportage and formal experimentation, capturing subjects ranging from the ocean liner Normandie to the aeronautical wind tunnel at Chalais-Meudon, railway workshops, construction sites, urban and industrial landscapes, from the Eiffel Tower to the backstage areas of the Opéra Garnier. Each square frame was conceived with elegant rigor, transforming the everyday into balanced and fascinating scenes.
Less known than some of his contemporaries, Gaston Paris remains an essential witness to the interwar period and post-war era. His work aligns with an aesthetic close to surrealism and "social fantastic," exploring society's margins and capturing gestures, gazes, and atmospheres with almost cinematic precision. From the backstage of Parisian cabarets to fairgrounds, from working-class neighborhoods to major events, he captured the ephemeral with rare sensitivity.
Collaborating with Man Ray, Robert Capa, and Germaine Krull for Vu magazine, Paris created reports covering cinema, theater, music, and political events, combining social curiosity with formal demands to make each of his images both a living document and a work of art. According to Blind Magazine, "the composition, lighting, and original point of view of the photographer had convinced," highlighting the originality of his vision and framing.
Certain emblematic compositions perfectly illustrate his approach: the aerodynamic wind tunnel at Chalais-Meudon, transformed into a photographic sculpture through the repetition of structures and vanishing lines; the illuminated Eiffel Tower at the 1937 Universal Exhibition, where monument and light merge into a graphic motif; portraits of Simenon, Cocteau, Piaf, and Jouvet, where each square framing reveals rare intimacy and subtle psychological sensitivity. These works demonstrate Paris's ability to capture the essence of his subjects within a rigorously constructed aesthetic, blending documentation and abstraction.
Compared to his contemporaries, Paris distinguished himself through the balance he established between reportage and graphic composition. While Robert Capa favored the decisive moment and Man Ray focused on surrealist experimentation, Gaston Paris combined these dimensions to produce images that were simultaneously historical documents and aesthetic objects. His ability to integrate human and poetic dimensions into industrial or urban landscapes also differentiated him from Germaine Krull, who was more focused on architectural abstraction.
After his death in 1964, the Roger-Viollet Agency acquired his entire production—nearly 15,000 negatives, now preserved at the Historical Library of the City of Paris. The 2022 retrospective at the Centre Pompidou had begun the recognition of his influence, while the Roger-Viollet gallery now offers a critical and in-depth reading of his method, highlighting his contribution to the formal structuring of modern photography and his ability to transform reality into graphic and poetic composition.
"The Balance of the Square" thus offers the public the opportunity to rediscover Gaston Paris as a major 20th-century photographer, whose mastery of framing and geometry reveals the poetic intensity of each image and makes his work an unparalleled social and historical chronicle of French society in transition. The exhibition runs from October 2, 2025, to January 17, 2026, at the Roger-Viollet Gallery, located at 6 rue de Seine, 75006 Paris, open Monday through Saturday from 11 AM to 7 PM.
