A black and white wide-angle shot of the Winged Victory of Samothrace statue surrounded by a large crowd holding up smartphones.
A man rides a bicycle past blurred urban buildings and cars in a motion-blurred black and white street photograph.
A black and white street-level shot captures feet and legs of people walking across a crosswalk, with motion blur.
Black and white view of a large modern interior space with a glass pyramid ceiling, featuring a blurred man walking in the foreground and a group of people standing together in the background.
A black and white night street scene in Paris showing people with a stroller crossing a wet road with blurred moving traffic.
A man in a dark coat stands under an arched doorway, viewed from behind with a hanging lamp overhead.
Black and white low-angle view of the illuminated Eiffel Tower at night with a blurred bus moving on the wet street and pedestrians on the sidewalk.
A black-and-white motion-blurred shot of a man standing beside a child seated on a carousel motorcycle.
Monochrome photograph of museum visitors photographing the Venus de Milo statue with their smartphones.
Low-angle black and white shot of a man walking up a modern train station staircase with overlapping ramps and lit steps.
Black and white street view of pedestrians walking across a crosswalk in Paris, casting long shadows in bright sunlight.
A black-and-white low-angle shot of a man walking across a paved plaza surrounded by towering modern skyscrapers.
A black and white motion-blurred shot of a man and a woman wearing helmets driving a scooter down a street in Paris.
Black and white close-up of a crowded room where multiple people hold up smartphones to take pictures.
Men walk along a wet street at night with the Eiffel Tower illuminated in the background.
Abstract black and white long exposure photograph showing blurred streaks of light against a dark background.
A black and white street view of the Eiffel Tower with a spinning carousel in motion on the left and blurred pedestrians walking in the foreground.
A framed portrait of the Mona Lisa is viewed through a foreground of out-of-focus hands holding devices, captured in monochrome.
Monochrome street view of Notre-Dame in Paris with pedestrians in motion in the foreground and traffic on the street.
A black-and-white street level shot of a man wearing a patterned jacket and beanie, walking amidst a crowd in Paris.
A man stands in a museum room with a large painting on the wall above a window, while another person is silhouetted in the foreground.

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Paris

Paris in Motion

A photo series about the restless pulse of Paris and the delicate moments that form within it. People and monuments interact in ever-changing compositions that exist only for a breath.

Type
Project
Location
Paris, France
Project
2023
Published
August 10 2026

Paris in Motion is about the way Paris is always moving. People cross streets, disappear into crowds, pass familiar places, and for a moment everything comes together before changing again.

I photographed around places like the Louvre, the Eiffel Tower and the boulevards, but I was less interested in making classic pictures of the landmarks themselves. What caught my attention was the movement around them: people passing through, small gestures, brief encounters and compositions that only existed for a second.

I like the contrast between the city’s old architecture and the people moving through it every day. The buildings stay, while everything around them keeps changing. For me, that is a big part of what Paris feels like.

Behind the Project

This section offers a little context to help understand the images and the ideas behind the project. It explains how the work was created, what it explores, and what you might notice when looking closely.

Project Philosophy

This project began with a question: What makes Paris recognisable?

The answer became clear: the Eiffel tower, the artworks, the buildings, and the people around them.

The enormous flow of visitors and locals brings Paris to life, yet it also exposes something unsettling about our small, overcrowded planet. We stand before masterpieces that took decades to create, but we often engage with them for only a few seconds, just long enough to take a selfie. The photographs reflect this contradiction.

By observing crowds as they move through sacred artistic spaces, the work becomes a mirror. It quietly asks: Are we truly appreciating what we came here to see? Or are we only consuming it for a passing moment of digital approval?

Through these images, Paris becomes a stage where humanity’s habits, desires, and contradictions perform openly.

Personal View

I often think about the contrast between life in the city and life in the countryside. They are completely different worlds, yet each has its own beauty. When I visited Paris, I tried to move with the city, to let its rhythm carry me instead of fighting against the rush. I had to speed up to match its energy, and to be honest, it felt both tiring and chaotic. But it was also strangely enjoyable.

Being surrounded by so many people reminded me how important it is to slow down, to look at each other, and to actually see the world around us. A bit more gentleness towards ourselves, towards others, and towards the spaces we share, could make our cities more liveable and our lives more meaningful. Even in a place as fast and overwhelming as Paris, there is room for stillness if we allow ourselves to find it.

Tools and Methods

The gear, processing, and conceptual choices behind the project.

01 Gear

Captured with the Sony A7 IV, Sigma 14-24mm f2.8 Art and Tamron 35-150mm f2-2.8 Di III VXD zoom lens.

02 Black & White

The choice of black and white removes the distractions of colour.


Black and white fits this theme because it removes the “tourist postcard” look and replaces it with something raw, timeless, and honest.

03 Added Grain

Grain emphasises texture, imperfection, and the documentary nature of the project. It gives the images a tactile feeling, like the dust and noise of a busy city settling onto the frame.

04 High Contrast

The strong contrast reflects the emotional extremes of a metropolis: chaos and calm, anonymity and presence, history and modernity. It also heightens the drama of each captured moment.

05 Motion Blur & Slow Shutter Speeds

Movement is not only shown but felt.

By using slow shutter speeds and intentional camera motion, the photographs express the instability of each moment. The blur becomes a visual metaphor for how quickly scenes dissolve in a crowded city. Nothing stays still, not even art.

06 Framing, Decomposition & Perspective

Many images are framed from the viewpoint of a participant rather than an observer. The framing places the viewer inside the crowd, letting him feel the same confusion, smallness, and overwhelming energy.

The fragmented compositions, where elements blur, overlap, or partially disappear, add a sense of disorientation and emotional intensity. 

The series is deliberately unsettling by design, reflecting the rushed, chaotic, and distracted way modern people experience iconic places today.

Sometimes the framing shows the city from beneath, behind, or within the masses, reinforcing the idea that the photographer is part of the crowd, not separate from it. This is especially powerful in scenes where people rush toward iconic artworks like the Mona Lisa.

Documenting

December 24-26, 2023

Paris, France

Behind the camera

Dávid Hosszú

Monochrome studio portrait of a man with a beard and hair tied in a bun, looking downward against a plain background.

I approach long-term projects as open studies of identity, place, and human experience. I’m curious about the patterns we share and the details that make us unique, the way expressions, posture, environment, and movement can tell parts of our stories.

My work combines observation, technical experimentation, and a genuine interest in the people and contexts I photograph. Whether I’m working with portraits or with the surrounding world, I try to create images that are both aesthetically refined and connected to simple questions with complex answers: Where do we come from? How do we shape each other? And what traces do we leave behind?

Read more about David

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