Finding order in disorder, walking to look and keeping an eye open to all the surprises: Marc Riboud has surveyed the planet for more than sixty years. On the occasion of the centenary of his birth, this retrospective book bears witness to the abundance of his work and to the singular, empathetic way in which Marc Riboud looked at the world. It presents previously unpublished images, notably his very first ones taken in the Alps in the 1940s and others taken in New York in the early 1950s to those of the 2000s, almost pictorial.

Understanding the world requires careful observation and to form an opinion, the photographer went to places where societies were changing: the 1954 dockers’ strike in Great Britain, Algeria during its independence in 1962, North Vietnam in 1969, the crowds of the Islamic revolution in Iran in 1979, not forgetting the metamorphoses of China, Ghana, Japan... «Photography cannot change the world, but it can show it when it changes,» he said. His images are as many encounters with other peoples as they are invitations to discover the beauty of elsewhere. Along the dusty or snowy roads, a science of framing and a search for harmony are outlined. «I take my hat off to the geometric and sensitive Marc,» said his friend Henri Cartier-Bresson.

A selection of contact sheets open the book, offering some keys to reading his approach to the subject. A text by Eric Fottorino, conceived as a poem, reveals various aspects of the life and work of Marc Riboud, completed by an illustrated biography of Catherine Riboud Chaine and Lorène Durret.