"30 avril 2023 à 22 heures 50"

pigmentbaed inkjet print on Hahnemühle paper 

signed, titled, numbered and dated (pencil) on recto

"On the sheet where I slept lay the book in which nothing is written."
Jean-Paul Dumas-Grillet

There is, of course, in Jean-Paul Dumas-Grillet’s photographs, a commitment to extreme austerity that does not invite verbal effusion. This is the polar opposite of the picturesque. It seems that the photographer applies Péreque’s precept: "You have to take it slowly, almost foolishly. Force yourself to write about what is uninteresting, what is most obvious, most common, most mundane." It is in this way – through this ascetic training of the gaze, this absolute prohibition against flashiness – that we learn, whether as writers or photographers, to truly see.
(Olivier Rolin, translated with deepL)¹

Note

1
Olivier Rolin, "La leçon de géographie", French original https://dumasgrillet.com/textes-critiques (accessed 1.10.2026)