Bettina Rheims, Serge Bramly, Rose, c'est Paris

Femme Fantômas. A detective story, told in photos and film, that unfolds in the streets, cafés, cabarets, abandoned factories, and grand hotels of Paris

Bettina Rheims and Serge Bramly's Rose, c'est Paris is both a photographic monograph and a feature-length film on DVD. This extraordinary work of art, in two different but interlocking and complementary formats, defies easy categorization. For in this multi-layered opus of poetic symbolism, photographer Bettina Rheims and writer Serge Bramly evoke the City of Light in a completely novel way: this is a Paris of surrealist visions, confused identities, artistic phantoms, unseen manipulation, obsession, fetish, and seething desire.

Equal parts erotica, fashion shoot, art monograph, metaphysical mystery, social and cultural archaeology of the French capital, and neo-noir art-house film - Rose, c'est Paris is the steamy tale of twin sisters, known only as B and Rose, and a third principal - the city itself. An abduction leads to a detective story that unfolds in the streets, cafés, cabarets, museums, abandoned factories, and grand hotels of Paris. What happened to the missing sister? Was there a plot? Was she really kidnapped? Is she alive or dead? Is it, in fact, a case of mistaken identity? Rheims and Bramly create a series of extraordinary tableaux suggesting all these possibilities and many more, featuring a host of celebrity figures, including Naomi Campbell, Michelle Yeoh, Monica Bellucci, Charlotte Rampling, Valérie Lemercier, Inès Sastre, Anna Mouglalis, Audrey Marnay, Anthony Delon, Rona Hartner, Jean-Pierre Kalfon, Azzedine Alaïa, Louise Bourgoin, and Hélèna Noguerra.

After our limited and art editions, this book is now available in a trade edition.

The artists:
French artist Bettina Rheims produced numerous major photographic series, which have been exhibited all over the world. Her books include Female Trouble (1989), Modern Lovers (1990), Chambre Close (1994), I.N.R.I. (1998), X'Mas (2000), Shanghai (2003), Héroïnes (2007), and The Book of Olga (2008 for TASCHEN).

Serge Bramly is an artist, writer and essayist and frequently collaborates on artistic and photographic projects with Bettina Rheims. His books include Leonardo: The Artist and the Man (1995) and Le Premier Principe (Prix Interallié, 2008).