Untitled 13, 2004-2008 from the series Quelle heure est-elle ?

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Untitled 29, 2004-2008 from the series Quelle heure est-elle ?

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Untitled 25, 2004-2008 from the series Quelle heure est-elle ?

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Untitled 140, 2004-2008 from the series Passengers

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Untitled 191, 2004-2008 from the series Passengers

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Untitled 188, 2004-2008 from the series Passengers

all pictures © CHRIS MARKER

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CHRIS MARKER captured, between 2008 and 2010, black and white images of commuters on the train without their knowledge, catching them in those fleeting moments of intimacy and alienation on the Paris Métro (cf. the series Quelle heure est-elle?). In order to capture his subjects “truer to their inner selves,” he explains, he used a digital wristwatch camera. Although he later used different contraptions, the title remained, reminding that the stolen moment of a woman’s face tells something about Time itself. The same idea is developed in the series Passengers (his first series in color).

French photographer and filmmaker, CHRIS MARKER (b.1921) is best known for his conceptual films Sans Soleil and La jetée (1962), a 29 minute film created almost entirely with still images which inspired DAVID and JANET PEOPLES to write the screenplay for 12 Monkeys.

And good news: Quelle heure est-elle? has been exhibited in 2009 at the Peter Blum Gallery in New York, and is also as part of the large CHRIS MARKER‘s retrospective featured in Arles this year (from July 4th through September 2011 in the Palais de l’Archevêché).

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found via La Lettre de la Photographie