Im Fokus: Jérôme Gence
"Im Fokus" is a collaboration between the Festival LaGacilly-Baden Photo, the Landesinnung Wien d. Berufsfotografie and the Leica Store Vienna.

Jérôme Gence is originally from the island of Réunion, where he grew up, and first discovered the Himalayas whilst at school through visiting guest speakers. The mountains became his childhood dream – a dream he realised in 2015 when he arrived in Nepal after travelling for over a year from Paris. It was during this journey that he took his first photographs. In Nepal, he met the photographer Eric Valli, who was moved by his early work and became his mentor.

In 2016, Jérôme held his first exhibition – “The Himalayas” – at the Yann Arthus-Bertrand studio in Paris, with the support of Canon France. Since then, he has taken a particular interest in the impact of the internet and new technologies on the lives of the people he photographs.

In 2018 and 2019, his photo essays “Livestreamers: The Geishas of The Internet” and “Virtual Singers: I love a Hologram” were shown at the annual Visa pour l’Image photography festival in Perpignan (France).

In 2020, Jérôme was invited to speak at the National Geographic Storyteller Summit in Washington. That same year, he also spoke at Google Talks about his background as a data analyst and photographer.

In 2021, he won the 2020 Pierre & Alexandra Boulat Award for his project “Telework”, which was also exhibited at Visa pour l’Image. In 2022, he also received the French National Library Prize for his project “The Screen Generation”.

Since then, his work “Virtual Singers: I love a Hologram” has been shown at the Open Your Eyes Festival in Zurich, and “The Screen Generation” was once again part of Visa pour l’Image.

His photo reports have been published in numerous international media outlets, including Le Figaro Magazine, Paris Match, Stern, Der Spiegel, Le Monde, Die Zeit, Polka, 6 Mois and National Geographic.

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