Masculin Singulier, dans l’ombre du poète brings together an uncommon dialogue between image and text, structured around eighty homoerotic poems by Constantin Cavafy and a photographic selection by Yves Paradis developed over more than five decades. The work establishes a direct correspondence between Cavafy’s poetic universe—marked by desire, memory, and evocation—and Paradis’ analytical gaze, which employs analog black-and-white photography to isolate the male body and transform it into a field of both formal and emotional inquiry. The translations by Marguerite Yourcenar and Constantin Dimaras reinforce this timeless dimension, transferring into French a body of poetry that retains its intimate intensity.
The book, composed of 167 pages and published by Images aux Quatre Vents in 2024, operates as a parallel structure of 80 texts and 80 images in which neither directly illustrates the other; instead, both function as autonomous layers that intersect. Paradis’ photographs, defined by technical precision and restraint, remove narrative context to focus on anatomy, light, and the contained tension of the body, while Cavafy’s texts introduce a fragmented temporality in which past and present dissolve into a nearly sensory perception of memory. The edition, limited to 600 copies, underscores its nature as a publication conceived equally for reading and contemplation.
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