Every native French speaker knows by heart these lines from Flowers of Evil by Charles Baudelaire: “The old Paris is no more (the form of a city changes faster, alas! than a mortal’s heart).” This form, as hinted at by the quotation, is not only a spatial or architectural given but also a cultural frame that dramatically depends on the combination of three elements: the built environment itself, the subjective experience of place and space by the city-dwellers and the visual and literary representation of this setting. The photographic mediation of the city cannot be separated from the literary and vice versa. A Grammar of Forms, the new project curated by Danièle Méaux, one of the leading scholars in contemporary visual culture in France, is tackling exactly that intersection of words and images in documenting and creatively rethinking the multilayered structure, perception and experience of the modern city.
The title...