Gilles Traverso is the third in a line of photographers from his family to capture the film elite every year of the Cannes Film Festival.
When the Cannes Film Festival begins this week, it will be its 78th year. And in each one of those years, a member of the Traverso family will have been there to photograph it.
Gilles Traverso, 67, is one of three generations of photographers who has taken pictures of the directors, actors and other members of the film elite who flock to the French city each year for the event.
This year will be his 49th festival. Since he began photographing it alongside his father, Henri, in 1977, Gilles has witnessed the event transform as digital cameras have proliferated, the number of photographers attending has exploded and celebrities have become more inaccessible to the public.
“The Cannes Film Festival is an exaggerated reflection of the time we live in,” he said in an interview in Cannes. But, he added, “What I hate is to say it was better before. I hate that. No, it was not better, it was something different.”
The Traverso family, originally from the Piedmont region of Italy, first moved to Cannes in the mid-19th century. In 1919, Auguste Traverso, then in his early 20s, set up a photography shop just as the city was beginning to evolve from a small fishing village to a vacation destination for the wealthy.
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Source: Movies - nytimes.com
