Juliette Francine is a photographer from Nice. Her work is intuitive, through photography she connects the intimacy of human body, yoga and contortion.

Repose: How would you describe what you do?

Juliette: I take photos. I try to recreate the images I have in my head. I’ve been photographing for a long time. I remember when I was a child, a friend of my parents took out a camera on the beach, I wanted to try it. I ended up buying one, and I never stopped.

Today, I mostly photograph people: bodies, postures, sometimes empty spaces, but the human element is always central. In middle and high school, I photographed my friends a lot, and myself too. I continued with my close circle, then with people who came into my life. I think that’s what you feel in my images, I often know the people I photograph, there’s a natural closeness.

Repose: What makes your work different?

Juliette: I think my background plays a role: I went to art school, then I studied circus, then a bit of dance. The body has always been a question for me : adolescence, insecurities, then the need for control, then the discipline of circus. All that has shaped my eye.

I’ve stopped intellectualising what I do. My work is very intuitive, not intellectual. I still wonder whether I really want to make it my profession, or whether it’s better to keep photography for myself.

Repose: What is your approach during photoshoots? How do you help people feel comfortable?

Juliette: It’s something I work on. Since I mostly photograph people close to me, they’re used to it, so it’s easy. With new people, I give very little direction. I ask them to find a comfortable posture, to move intuitively. The first few minutes are always more rigid, and then something relaxes, and I find again what I had seen in them before taking the photo.

Repose: What inspires you?

Juliette: The people around me. I need to know people to want to photograph them. And also this place, the South of France. I was born here. The light, the colors, even if it’s not literal in my work, they nourish me. I mostly photograph urban environments, but the calm and ease I look for probably come from here.

Repose: What would you say to the person you were when you started this project?

Juliette: I would tell myself to stop overthinking. When I was younger, I did things intuitively, and that’s often what works best. The more you know, the more you compare yourself, the more you doubt. I’d like to regain that early spontaneity.

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