Yves Marchand & Romain Meffre | Reviews
British Journal of Photography
NEW WORLD ORDER | RUINS OF DETROIT | Interviews by Lucy Davies | January 2011
Yves Marchand and Romain Me re’s study of Detroit, a city seemingly poised in transition from galactic metropolis to dust and prairie, is one of a welter of recent photographic projects worldwide to posit ruins as small pieces of history in suspension. Theirs is an exceptional example of the genre, taking the story of this modern-day Pompeii, in which all the archetypal signs of the American dream – movie theatres, dance halls, a grandiose train station, libraries, schools, housing projects – have been abandoned in the wake of the collapse of the motor industry over the course of five decades.
The Observer
RUINS OF THE AMERICAN DREAM | January 2011
Hotels and swimming pools, movie houses and schools: hundreds of abandoned buildings line the streets of downtown Detroit, evidence of the motor city’s painful decline. These photographs document what remains of an extraordinary city – and hint at the bigger picture of post-industrial America.
Intelligent life
AMERICAN RUINS | February 2012
Abandoned buildings are in mourning. They grieve for the lives that their damp and empty rooms have left behind. In their prime, these monumental breakers, lead works and turbine halls presented a public face to the world. They were the arena where men and women toiled and enter- prise ended in success or failure. Now they are shut away, left to mourn in silence.
Read the full Intelligent life American ruins here
Le Monde Portfolio
HASHIMA, L' ÎLE AU TEMPS SUSPENDU | April 2013
Depuis le milieu du xixe siècle, l’île japonaise Hashima vivait au rythme du charbon, ravitaillant les bateaux qui croisaient entre la Chine et les Etats-Unis. Et puis le pétrole est venu, et « l’île cuirassée » a décliné. Dé nitivement abandonnée en 1974, elle est devenue une attraction touristique, en voie de déliquescence. Les Français Yves Marchand et Romain Meffre y ont immortalisé les derniers stigmates de la vie.
Read the full Le Monde Portfolio article here
The Guardian
DETROIT IN RUINS: THE PHOTOGRAPHS OF YVES MARCHAND AND ROMAIN MEFFRE | April 2013
In downtown Detroit, the streets are lined with abandoned hotels and swimming pools, ruined movie houses and schools, all evidence of the motor city's painful decline. The photographs of Yves Marchand and Romain Meffre capture what remains of a once-great city – and hint at the wider story of post-industrial America
Read the full The Guardian Detroit in ruins: the photographs of Yves Marchand and Romain Meffre here
The Huffington Post
Detroit - The Ruins of an Empire: A Conversation with Photographers Marchand and Meffre | by Kisa Lala | April 2013
Yves Marchand and Romain Meffre met online in 2002, drawn by their love of contemporary ruins. Meffre was only aged 15 when he met Marchand, and they began visiting ruins in the suburbs of Paris to capture the lost grandeur of old movie theaters and document architecture in decline. In the beginning they took images separately, but after investing in a large format 4x5, they began their collaboration. They spoke to me recently from Paris about their photographic project, “Detroit in Ruins,“ published by Steidl in 2010.
Read the full The Huffington Post Detroit - The Ruins of an Empire here
intertheory
It Will Arise from the Ashes, or Exploring the Aesthetics of Postmodern Ruin Photography in
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