Ask Paris-based photographer Franck Bohbot what matters most to him about his documentary, fine-art and advertising photography, and he’ll tell you: “Staying true to my creative vision and making a lasting impact with my work.”
He certainly achieves this, whether viewing one of his earliest, personal series of New York City streetball courts or his latest contract photographing performance artists modeling outrageous haute couture for Dutch fashion designer Iris van Herpen. He is known for his fashion and beauty photographs; portraits; portrayals of places, architecture and lifestyle; and videos. With his refined color sense, evocative lighting, thoughtful composition and compelling narratives, he successfully merges reality with what lies within and beyond, seizing details many others would miss along the way.
“We were after this ethereal, magical quality,” says Katie Walker, who worked with Bohbot on a 2023 ad campaign for beauty brand SheaMoisture Men. Walker, the project’s executive producer, and her team at Venice, California–based production company Durable Goods wanted “someone whose images were cinematic and who could navigate between portraits, street-style photography and interiors,” as she explains.
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Titled Black Men Love, the campaign required depicting Black men’s everyday lives in a variety of roles—young father, artist, wellness coach and teacher. On reviewing Bohbot’s portfolio, Ronn Richardson, former head of creative at Unilever/SheaMoisture and SheaMoisture Men, recalls, “I found his ability to tell a comprehensive and compelling story in a single shot impressive and captivating. The visuals, color treatment and intentionality in each photo aligned perfectly with our vision. For this campaign, his photos reflect authenticity, realism and depth. They capture the true essence of Black men and showcase their diversity and individuality. The color treatment and tones he used were in perfect harmony with the brand visual identity and brought the campaign concept to life, holistically and creatively—just as we envisioned.”
Since 2007, when he first picked up a camera, Bohbot has photographed neighborhoods in Dubai for Leica Camera and Dubai Economy and Tourism, actor Hannah Ware for Women’s Wear Daily, photographer Cindy Sherman for Beaux Arts magazine, and New York independent booksellers for the Guardian. His lengthy client list dazzles with names such as Dior, manufacturing company Knoll, the New York Times, Sony Music, Sotheby’s, Valentino, Vanity Fair and Vogue. He has published three monographs and has won several awards, including the Archifotos 2014 prize and the Golden Neutral Density Photography (ND) Award in 2017.
Photography wasn’t the first career choice for Bohbot, now 44, but the arts have always been a part of his life. As a teen growing up in the ’80s in the Paris suburb of Longjumeau, he often played drums in a family band and formed a rock band and then a hip hop band with friends. Film came next: in 2006, he earned an MBA in audiovisual, film production and media from then-named L’ESG à Paris (now known as ESG Management School), with his eye on the entertainment industry.
Bohbot figured a year in New York City would best prepare him for a future in production and media management, and right after graduating, he took off for an internship with the Brooklyn Film Festival. A friend from Paris coincidentally living there took him around to art shows where, at one of them, he met French photographer Josquin Gouilly Frossard. “Before this, I had never considered photography as a potential career path,” says Bohbot. With his enthusiasm for cinema and directors like Paul Thomas Anderson, Stanley Kubrick and Martin Scorsese, he started experimenting with a DSC-S700, a small digital camera, shooting black-and-white landscapes and playing with light and composition. “I moved back to France promising myself that I would return to New York and go all in,” he says.
There, Bohbot began photographing young actors in Paris for their portfolios and working as a still photographer on short film sets. “This allowed me to understand how a film crew operates and how to work with light. It was an incredible learning experience,” he says. His Levitation series was his first significant personal project, in 2007, of people in the streets of Paris appearing to stand and walk in midair. “But I felt something was missing in my work,” he says.
So, he surrounded himself with photography books, studying technique and photos by William Eggleston, Andreas Gursky and Stephen Shore, among others. Then, there was Julius Shulman and his architectural photos. “Seeing his work was a revelation, a turning point in my career,” says Bohbot. “The way he captured modern houses in black and white using large-format cameras to create stunning compositions with light and shadow left a profound impact on me. Recognizing that Shulman had mastered black and white, I felt compelled to develop my own style using color instead.”
Bohbot began focusing on his newfound appreciation for the architecture around him in Paris, shooting public swimming pools and libraries as well as portraits and street scenes. In 2013, he moved back to New York City on an arts visa with his wife Kate. The following year, the New York Times published his first series of portraits, Cuts, of barbershops and their owners, and his Chinatown series appeared in WIRED. His self-published book Last Stop - Coney Island (2013) was joined three years later by Light on New York City (teNeues, 2016) of his photographs of the city at night.
“What I love about architecture is that it is timeless and I can put my own vision to it,” Bohbot explains. “Then, I might see something where I can add someone inside and create a more staged scene. We build places for people—for studying, working, playing. I’m fascinated by how we interact in them. They offer me a canvas where the ordinary becomes extraordinary, capturing moments of human interaction and solitude.”
Before starting a personal project, Bohbot researches the history, architecture and cultural significance of the location. “While photographing, I work instinctively and contemplatively, letting the environment guide me. I’m inspired by the interplay of light and color, the passage of time, and the stories that unfold within life,” he says. Lighting is crucial to his work, both natural and portable, and muted hues dominate his personal photos, which adds “a timeless aspect to the story, emphasizing the mood and atmosphere,” as he describes. He relies on minimal color correction, aiming for a natural feel that could be confused for an analog image.
Bohbot’s 2018 series of independent booksellers in Manhattan and Brooklyn expressed the then-best of his photos combining architecture with portraiture. He took the opportunity to expand on the genre when he, Kate, and their daughters Clara and Chloe moved to Los Angeles (LA), making it their second home. His first personal series shot there, Angels, of people among the buildings and on beaches, led to the night photography of LA Confidential. Bohbot pays tribute to Hollywood’s Golden Age with his series The Last Show, photos of the inside of the city’s empty baroque, art nouveau, art deco and modern movie theaters. Also in 2019, LA’s arcades kept his camera busy eliciting their inner-circle ambiance in subtle aquas, pinks and yellows. In 2022, the New York Times featured these photos, 150 of which also appear in Bohbot’s third monograph Back to the Arcade (Setanta, 2023).
Caryn Leeds, vice president of Wolf|Kasteler Public Relations’s LA branch, says, “Franck has a style not like anyone else’s, which is rare for our actor-client shots. He’s a French guy shooting in LA, and it’s LA style—but also his perception of LA.” Whether he trains his camera on Ware in her home or Israeli actor Shira Haas in front of the Four Seasons Hotel in Beverly Hills, “there’s something about his photos that feels California vintage,” she explains.
Bohbot also is “so easy to work with,” says Leeds, who first hired him in 2021. “He makes our clients really comfortable, and they can have fun with him. And you just know for sure you’re going to get beautiful photographs with a point of view.”
Durable Goods’s Walker agrees: “Franck brings a calm positivity to his work. He seamlessly wove in and out of the set to capture images that feel warm, inviting, soulful and intimate.” Richardson adds: “And he’s a team player, approachable and open to creative direction.”
Collaboration is vital to Bohbot. “It means working closely with clients from the initial concept to the final image and ensuring that their vision is brought to life,” he says. “More and more, I love working with clients. It’s become my personal way of shooting, too: My client work refines my skills and brings professional discipline to my personal work. My personal work is a space for creative exploration, which often inspires fresh perspectives in my client projects.”
Both clearly converge in Bohbot’s photographs for fashion designer Iris van Herpen and her “Hybrid” show on June 24, 2024, during Paris Haute Couture Week. It was the first time she featured her bewitching dresses with aerial sculptures and her first time working with Bohbot. Marit de Hoog, head of collaborations and PR, and van Herpen came across his images while researching “the best exhibition and museum photographers in France,” as de Hoog explains. “We were captivated by his talent for photographing complex sculptures, structures and spaces in the most beautiful way.”
Two months before the presentation, Bohbot and van Herpen met to discuss the creative vision. “After the first ten minutes, they were fully aligned on the ideas for the show,” says de Hoog. The brief was challenging—to photograph semitransparent aerial sculptures combined with five performance artists wearing van Herpen’s couture and “plastered” to canvases at a height of 1.7 meters, each of them slowly shifting their bodies, “like living artworks,” as de Hoog describes it.
On the day of the show in Paris, they had very little time beforehand to shoot without the audience. “Franck did this in the most perfect way like we couldn’t imagine,” says de Hoog. What stood out for her and van Herpen was “his unique, creative vision on photographing sculptures
in a complicated space with limited lighting and also for capturing the movements and emotions of the performance artists in a magical way—like poetry.”
The project further ignited Bohbot, who stays fired up by immersing himself in different art forms, going to museums and traveling. His passion for photography—a blend of artistic vision, technical precision, and expertise in both architecture and portraiture—has contributed to his success. So have his commitments to taking creative risks in both composition and color, maintaining strong client relationships, and consistently delivering high-quality work.
Bohbot makes sure he’s always learning, experimenting with new techniques and keeping his eyes open to the unexpected as he walks around the city scouting out new places to photograph. Since he left LA with his family in 2023, those places are not just in Paris now but elsewhere in the world as well, most recently Europe.
“I’m eager to connect and collaborate with new creative partners who have great ideas, continue working with wonderful clients, and develop new personal projects,” he says. “I’m thrilled about the endless possibilities for growth and reaching wider audiences with my photography.” ca