Liberté d'Expression

• Photographer
  Christophe Kiciak, France, Metropolitan
• Studio
  Christophe Kiciak
• Website
  http://www.flickr.com/gyaban_fr

Everything photographed and edited by me.

As you probably know, on 7 January 2015 occurred the deadliest act of terrorism in France
of the last 50 years. 12 persons died in the offices of "Charlie Hebdo", a satirical
newspaper, because they believed in an absolute form of freedom of expression. I must
confess this tragedy hurt me deeply. A few days later, a gigantic march occurred in Paris
as an historical act of protestation against terror, against censorship. At least
everything is not lost, millions of people still believe in those values: it was somewhat
heart-warming.

The day after that march, I decided to pay an homage to this reaction, by recreating
another version of the famous painting "La liberté guidant le peuple" by Eugène Delacroix.
In this version, I replaced all the weapons by pens, pencils, cameras or books, as a
metaphor for the defense of freedom of expression.

Of course, that painting involves various characters, and I don't have access to lots of
models. As a consequence, I brought my camera at work, and quickly organized a shooting
session. It was a bit challenging, but lots of people spontaneously accepted to pose for
the project. Thank you so much everyone!

Vive la Liberté !