Christer Strömholm: Les Amies De Place Blanche

Jacky, place Blanche 1961

"This is a book about the quest for self-identity, about the right to live, about the right to own and control one's own body.

(...)

These are images of women - biologically born as men - that we call 'transsexuals'.

As for me, I call them 'my friends of place Blanche'. This friendship started here, in the early 60s and it still continues."

Christer Strömholm, 1983

I could have titled this blog post: "Why Les Amies De Place Blanche is my favourite photo book in the world", or "Why I am completely in love with Christer Strömholm's photos". But no - let's keep up at least the weak pretence of neutrality, shall we?
(This mere semblence of an unbiased photo book review won't last for longer than a few lines, I fear. I'm way too much in awe.)

Published in 1983, Les Amies De Place Blanche regained quite a bit of attention lately when the popular website BuzzFeed picked it up and the photos subsequently circulated on Facebook and Twitter. The book has been on my bookshelve for a while by then, and it was a lovely surprise to see the new attention to it.
The pictures are Strömholm's record of his time in Paris, when he lived in the red light district of Pigalle and became close friends with many of the trans women - some post-op, some pre-op -, the so-called 'nightbirds' who mainly earned their money by prostitution. The Swedish photographer and the girls lived on the same floor of a cheap hotel, and shared their lives in the night.

"Often, around 2 o'clock in the afternoon, I heard knocking on the wall of my room. It was Cobra, telling me coffee was ready. We had coffee with milk in her room on the 5th floor of the hotel Chappe. There were breadcrumbs in bed. We had been sleeping since dawn and it would soon be dark."

Nana, 1959

It is a lovely book, the 2011 edition printed extraordinarily well by Dewi Lewis. The pictures are of astonishing quality - beautifully lit and framed, great portraits and observed moments. But it is not the quality alone that makes the book outstanding to me. It is the story that the pictures tell.
Unlike many other projects (particularly from the last ten years, surprisingly) the subjects in Les Amies De Place Blanche are not treated as outcasts, as curious struggling individuals defined by their fleeting gender alone. They are not exploited, not photographed solely for the sake of the spectacle or a political agenda. The pictures tell the story - the title gives it away - of a deep and lasting friendship in the first place; the gender plays only a secondary role. In the 2011 book, you'll find a short introduction to all the girls and their stories, the so-called 'family album', and the personal accounts of Nana and Jacky, two of Strömholm's closest friends and favourite subjects.

Gina & Nana, place Blanche 1963

The girls in these pictures have dignity, and Strömholm treats them with respect - and because he is so close to them, he is able to look behind the facade. Just look at Jacky's upbeat personality that punches you through the frame, or Nana's subtle sadness. I feel that the trust the girls had in the photographer is tangible. A few of the pictures are snapshots of the girls joking around in their rooms, or meeting their boyfriends. Anybody could be in these pictures - I think its great that neither Christer Strömholm nor the 'nightbirds' let themselves be reduced to photographing/being trans. It is a message to all of us (attention, pathos!): Trans people are having lives that go beyond their gender, they enjoy life as much as others, they don't want to be pitied all the time. Meet them, talk to them, get to know them. Les Amies De Place Blanche serves a splendid example of how portraits are made with respectfulness and love. Given the fact that the project was made in the 1950s and 60s, it is a shame that not many photographers seem to have learned from it since.

Christer avec Panama, 1968

All pictures by Christer Strömholm.