“Anne Favret and Patrick Manez are well acquainted with the urban landscape. To journey with them is to see with fresh eyes the soul of a city: they reveal through intricate paths and byways such hidden patterns that are invisible even to the most discerning. The mission entrusted to them was to preserve, in photographic form, that which would soon be lost. But they have gone well beyond: they have sought and found the cornerstones of vital memory. They have brought together within each vignette that forms this exhibit, that which is at the very heart of an hospital complex: the unusual connections, the dialogues public and private by which patients and their carers meet, rub shoulders and otherwise intersect during their journeys to spaces within and without. And if the view camera remains the preferred tool by which to capture the light, it is clear that they have the power to use the apparatus to see beyond the surface of things. Entering this world today, the passer-by may be surprised by the hidden strength of these photographic diptychs. They invite us to consider that it is the side-view, the glimpse from the edge or at the border, whence we perceive nuances and colours; the rustling of a distant memory – of a time and a place where beings and things sing in several voices.”
Yannick Geffroy