Chongqing, on the Four Banks of Time – Photographs by Cyrus Cornut

Throughout the month of May, for the^third consecutive year, the Orangerie at the Jardin des Plantes is hosting an exhibition by artist Cyrus Cornut as part of the “Parallèle” section of the Boutographies Festival, a major photography event in Montpellier.

Photographer Cyrus Cornut, who trained as an architect, focuses his work primarily on the city—its form, its evolution, its traces, its voids—and on the human behaviors it elicits.
In 2006, his first series on Chinese cities was exhibited at the Rencontres Internationales de la Photographie d’Arles under the artistic direction of Raymond Depardon. Starting in 2011, his research also began to focus on the role of vegetation in the urban landscape. This led him to create a series in 2017 on the world’s largest metropolis, Chongqing, in China.

The municipality of Chongqing, in the People’s Republic of China, has experienced one of the world’s fastest rates of population and economic growth, now reaching 34 million inhabitants.
Chongqing, the “Mountain City,” crisscrossed by the Yangtze and Jialing rivers, struggles to break through the thick fog that shrouds it year-round.
Urban forms and infrastructure have sprung up, defying gravity, hugging the contours of its four steep banks carved by its waterways. The speed of urbanization has overtaken the slow pace of the fishermen, the erosion of the rivers, and the powerful emergence of the mountains.

Here, Cyrus Cornut presents a striking work of visual contrasts, through which his vision of humanity in relation to society and its environment shines through.