Arles, its stars, the “off” celebrities, the unknown, the enthusiasts that arrive with no possibilities, without knowing anyone, trying to put a foot in the door… Anaïs has two points in common with Raymond Depardon : she is a farmer’s daughter and she loves Africa.

She’s a brunette, dry and athletic like the Provence region. She is from around here. Not Arles, but Rognonas, a village a few miles from Avignon. She’s showing nine photographs in Café Le France, Place Lamartine, near the train station and the river Rhône…

A place I cold never have been without losing myself. On the wall of the venue, nine images from Mauritius and Rwanda. Three “talk” to me. There is something going on between the photographer, the photographed and the observer.

“I began photography at 16, paying cash with small coins for a camera, without the knowledge of my parents. Oh.. my father is a farmer, so I’ve worked hard with him to have those coins, and some more, to set off to Mauritius on a bicycle.”

On a bike? “I’ve also biked in Ethiopia… I am proud to be a woman and also to travel by myself on a bicycle. Of course, that implies training, but I am a girl from the land. My father has melon in Summer, and salad in Winter. It’s hard. It’s a school of endurance, of courage, but also, results. We sow and harvest. I do the same way with photography. I work. One day, I’ll harvest.”

“The bike and working the land has allowed me to have an easy passage with the people I would meet in Africa. Photography in Africa was not the only thing I did. I also lived in Paris and I am currently working on a subject on coiffeurs in different countries. I have also shot in Rwanda and Mali.”

At thirty years old, the young lady is determined. Courageous as she is, she has performed hard activities as the land and nurse’s aide in order to accomplish the luxury of taking pictures.

“I am impatiently waiting for the sabbatical year that I’ve asked my employer to invest In trying to enter into the professional world. I have over ten years’ worth of images to show since I began photographing.”

Michel Puech