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#flashHeader{visibility:visible !important;}You're piggybacking on your brother's shoulders, the wind on your face as you run through the grass. You're messy, climbing, hair astray. You're belly-down on a swing. Flying.
Alain LaboileIn his series of carefully composed black-and-white images that make up “La Famille,†the French photographer Alain Laboile has captured a sense of youthful freedom through the exploits of his six children.
Mr. Laboile publishes his photos in serial form, sharing them with the world from the user name “lab oil†on Flickr. They are simple, beautiful moments.
A sculptor by trade, Mr. Laboile bought a sm all digital camera to photograph his work in 2004. He became interested in macro photography and later began documenting the children: Four girls - Olyana, now 16; Luna, 14; Dune, 5; and Nil, 4 - and two boys - Merlin, 12, and Eliott, 18, a student who now lives in Bordeaux.
Alain LaboileTheirs is a family photo album thrown before the world. Taken as a whole, the images do not evoke anything specific, so much as a feeling. Mr. Laboile's constant presence has rendered his lens nearly invisible; the children continue their games, rarely acknowledging the camera. He never asks the children to pose, but if one of them doesn't like a picture he has taken, he won't publish it online.
He originally joined an online photography community seeking com ments and criticism from other photographers. “When social networks appeared,†he wrote in French via e-mail, “I continued to share this with my friends, then gradually with strangers around the world.â€
The reception, he said, has been a pleasant surprise â€" comments from people whose own childhood memories are stirred by the images. The feedback encouraged him to continue sharing the work.
Alain LaboileWhen one commenter noted that the photos have the feel of street photography, Mr. Laboile happily adopted the idea. “I really liked the analogy,†he said.
Most of the viewers are drawn to the nostalgic quality of the work. “That's a sweet reminder of youthful delight,†one commenter wrote on a photo posted to Flickr last week.
Mr. Laboile was born in Gironde, in the southwest of France, in 1968. He never left. He likes to think of the stream that borders his family's property as a boundary between the realm that is theirs and the world everyone else inhabits. “The stream on the edge of the world,†he said.
Despite his careful documentation, Mr. Laboile has only one picture from his own childhood. “The practice of photography isn't a family legacy, but a personal passion,†he said.
What happens when the children grow up?
“I think I will continue, as long as there are children at home,†Mr. Laboile said, but he added that while he had other types of photography to explore, the family album remained a constant.
And maybe, he mused, there will be grandchildren down the road.
Alain LaboileMr. Laboile's images from “La Famille†are on display through Feb. 8 at the Centre Communal d'Action Sociale in Bordeaux. They were exhibited at the Salon de la Photo in Paris and Galerie L'Area in Nice, and, more recently, were projected at the Angkor Photo Festival in Cambodia.
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