Portraits of Strangers on the Street
Taking nice portraits in a studio setting requires a great skill set and understanding of how to set up lights. Doing the same thing, but on the street with complete strangers takes the skill one step further. Benoit Paillé, Quebec based photographer, recently released images from his latest project titled, “Stranger Project” in which he breaks the norm of “not speaking or disturbing” strangers in order to create stunning portraits on the street.
Paille, whose surreal landscapes photos have been featured before on Fstoppers, says the project started in 2007 when he decided he wanted to take portraits of strangers on the street. But rather than doing it hidden or from the hip (as I recently did on my trip to New York) he would talk to the people and let them know what he was up to and get them on board. His goal was to “break the individualism and anonymity of the big city” reaching out to people “break the usual way this modern world works.” Currently he is up to 222 photographs of strangers and eventually looks to publish a book with the photos and stories from each encounter.
