’Paolo Roversi’ at Paris’ Palais Galliera is the first large-scale exhibition of the seminal fashion photographer’s work in his home city.

A Paolo Roversi photograph can be recognised immediately: a soft, gauzy focus, a rich interplay between shadow, colour and light, and a mood of painterly, sepia-toned romance. Sometimes, they appear like a relic from the past – other times, they are jarringly contemporary, capturing the strange, otherworldly forms of avant-garde designers like Rei Kawakubo and Yohji Yamamoto, with whom Roversi has had a long artistic communion.

‘Paolo’s photography is timeless,’ says Sylvie Lécallier, the curator of a new exhibition of Roversi’s work which opened earlier this month at Paris’ Palais Galiera (until 14 July 2024). ’It is detached from the spirit of the times, from the ephemeral trends of fashion. It is located both at the heart of fashion and at the edge. This is what makes him a photographer apart.’

Titled, simply, ‘Paolo Roversi‘, the exhibition includes 140 photographs by the photographer, who was born in Ravenna, northern Italy, before moving to Paris in 1973, where he began in photography, first as a reporter. In 1980, he photographed a campaign for Christian Dior beauty; later, he would go on to shoot for a slew of fashion titles, including Vogue France, Vogue Italia, and Egoïste, as well as immortalising the supermodels of the day, from Inès de la Fressange and Stella Tennant to Naomi Campbell and Kate Moss.

His distinctive style, which has included work on Polaroid as well as gelatin silver and dye transfer prints, is largely achieved through long-exposure manipulation of light, which Lécallier calls ’drawing with light’. ’[It is as if] his models and clothes are appearing from darkness,’ she continues. ’The shooting is akin to a real performance. He is like a painter, a conductor.’

As for why his collaborations with designers in particular were so successful – from Kawakubo and Yamamoto to Romeo Gigli and Azzedine Alaïa – Lécallier puts it down to Roversi’s good taste. ’Paolo has a real taste for beautiful clothes, as well as a great respect for designers who have a very strong creative universe,‘ she says. Her own favourite photograph in the display is not of a particular subject, but a pair of shoes, reflected in a mirror.

‘Paolo Roversi’ runs at Paris’ Palais Galliera until 14 July 2024.

Photography by Paolo Roversi