The first impulse behind this experimental project was to inject street photography methodology into architecture photography. This series plays with the notion of contextual portraiture. On one hand, architecture is used as a frame, focusing compositions onto a subject with bold volumes and strong lines. On the other hand, people give meaning and scale to the spaces shown. Their attitude builds our perception of the building’s atmosphere. We are shaped by our environment, and we shape it continuously and subconsciously, by the simple act of inhabiting it.
Philippe Sarfati is a french architect and independant photographer. After graduating, he moved from Paris to Rotterdam, to work as an architect with a dutch firm. In the following year, his photography series 'Territories', infusing architecture photography with street photography methods, was selected in several international photography competitions and festivals, and he established himself as a photographer. He is now working on a photography book centered on this project.
