A White Christmas with Maud Maillard

We met at nighttime, a stark contrast to the very aesthetic that serves as a foundation of our friendship and one that is quite difficult to ignore as we stand side by side in the midst of RIPOSTE's ‘Le White' exhibition that celebrates the void of colour evident in the art that occupies the space. I take a sip of my complimentary beer and as we laugh away, I can't help but think of the circumstances under which we met just over a week previously.

The setting of our first encounter: a smoke-filled darkness, disturbed only by the strobe lights that bound erratically - as if startled by the hundred-decibel music - across the smoke cloying around the anonymous faces of the dancing nyctophiles, it glides across to my face, and then her's.

Her eyes were also following the light, and although the light had moved its focus onto other less interested subjects, her eyes remain fixed on me. Her gaze is unyielding and her curiosity seems to penetrate the smoke and sound that fill the room so effusively. Her curiosity is infectious and it is only when I take the final sip of my liquid courage that I make my way through the hurry  - a little more successfully than our disconcerted pharos - to introduce myself. She returns the gesture, I have just met Maud Maillard, a twenty-something photographer with a penchant for shooting young men and good food. As we get to know each other (or as best you can after several alcoholic beverages in a nightclub), it would seem I fall into the former of her favourite subjects and she lets slip that she would like to shoot me. Flattered and exhausted, we exchange our contact details before I consent to head home to sleep off what will surely be a painful reminder of my very merry first thanksgiving the following morning.

In the following days, texts fly back and forth and she informs me that she would be interested in shooting me for her first exhibition in a week's time and a date of our shoot is finally confirmed.

It's an early morning start for both of us as I make my way to her apartment in the heart of the Bastille area of Paris. No sooner have I arrived does she hand me a steaming mug of tea, whisk me around her creative corner of the world and introduce me to her two lapine friends with whom she shares it (Njut & Gotham).

Maud explains the aesthetic she wants to achieve. The exhibition - organised by RIPOSTE - will celebrate the opening of new concept store 'Le White' at the Splendens Factory, which will feature only ‘white' art and tells me that what she wants is to capture the beauty of simplicity, of ‘le quotidien', before emptying a bag of props onto her bed. Among the bric-a-brac: a toothbrush, shaving foam and a plain white tee.

Used to directing models from some of the biggest agencies in Paris, she has no qualm whatsoever directing me as we move from room to room of her apartment. I begin brushing my teeth in her bathroom until she abruptly exclaims ‘not white enough' and hands me the bottle of shaving foam. A lot of laughs and a foamy mess later, she orders me to strip. A little startled by her frankness, I hesitate and she heads to her radio - that until this point had been crooning almost silently in the background - and turns up the volume. An upbeat anonymous track gives me the push I need and before I've even taken my tee-shirt off, the click of her camera is in sync with the allegro. Next on the tracklist, one of Lorde's more downbeat tracks, I head to the window and stare out onto the ‘veins of my city', she falters not and captures my sentimental moment (above). My attention is brought back to reality with the tick of the shutter.

Satisfied, Maud Maillard puts down her camera, turns off the bi-polar radio and prepares another tea.