Hello, my name is Raphaël Gianelli-Meriano, I’m a French director and photographer.

You might have come across some of my photography work, About Estonia, at La Cité de la Mode, in Paris, last year.

Today I’d love to tell you about my new project for a photography book, entitled “Letters Home”.

Why Letters Home?

“This book records a period of my life when I was mostly traveling and living abroad. Intimate photographs of my friends and our daily lives kept track of what one might call Home.”

Most of the images of the book were taken between 2003 and 2010. In Berlin, Great Britain, USA, Estonia, Russia or Iceland, France of course. I took pictures of my friends to document the fact that I was next to them in some important moments of their lives.

There are also some landscapes, interiors or objects that I came across traveling. Those poetic moments in between actions, which I love to photograph.

At that time, I was using a 24X36 camera which I charged with cinema film, I also used a medium format camera.

I believe it’s important to keep track of those moments, people and who we were at a certain time of our lives.

That is what I’d like to share with you through my book and those images. It’s not only about me and them it’s also about you, us.

1991Books, a young Paris based publishing house, helped me in putting together the layout and the book.

All the 44 images of the book are analog.

Coming along with them, is a poem by Estonian author Jaan Kaplinski, whom writings inspired me for some years already. I even shot a documentary film on our encounter.

Letter Home