While his portraits of Serge Gainsbourg are currently exhibited in Paris 25 years after the death of the famous songwriter, Gérard Schachmes talks to us about his own work and selected for us a few of his portraits made between the 1980s and 2008.
For over 40 years, I’ve photographed stars and celebrities for magazines all over the world. I was lucky to follow certain people over the years: Brigitte Bardot, Céline Dion, Philippe Noiret… I like it when they forget me. I followed Céline Dion for one year during a world tour.
I always considered myself a portraitist. I also like the studio as it involves creating a direct relation with the person whom I photograph. There is no decor, nothing on which to rest. It’s the exchange between the model and the photographer which emerges from the photographs. Each session is unique.
It was at the beginning of 1989 that Phillipe Lerichomme, Serge Gainsbourg’s artistic director, chose me for a photo session to promote Bambou’s album. Serge and Bambou posed together, first in the recording studio, then during a big session in a photo studio. I asked Serge to leave his dark sunglasses and cigarettes to the side. Nothing artificial, nothing staged, just them, beautiful. They both liked the photos, and, a couple of days later, followed a session with Bambou alone. Then Serge got sick and hid out in the Hotel Raphaël to recover. The paparazzi waited on rue de Verneuil, and, since it would be calmer, Serge asked me to do the photos at the hotel with Bambou and Lulu. Philippe Lerichomme was ok with it, and the session made the cover of Paris-Match.
Serge was feeling better and started filming his fourth long-feature film “Stan The Flasher” with Claude Berri acting. I had already done several films over the course of my career with the biggest stars, so I was comfortable with everything. I asked Serge if I could come to the filming. He accepted, so it was natural that he would ask me to do another session in the studio with Claude Berri. We put a film camera on the set. Serge and Claude were very good friends and it was clear they were really accomplice. They mutually teased each other during the entire session. Serge would later say when seeing the photos, “I’m not bad, when I smile.”
Serge and I would talk about photos or cinema, we worked. For each session, we would give each other the best of ourselves. There was some form of recognition between us, an invisible line coming from our common origins, no doubt.
Gérard Schachmes
EXHIBITION
« Serge Gainsbourg by Gérard Schachmes »
Prints are made by Picto Lab.
From February 25th to April 11th, 2016
Hôtel Raphaël
17 avenue Kléber
75116 Paris
France
