Magnum Poster: Gare du Nord. Paris, France, 2020

From the first day of confinement following the outbreak of the Covid-19 epidemic, Antoine d’Agata roamed the streets and train stations of Paris with a thermal camera to record the viral epidemic that turned the city into a strange theatre of wandering souls, bowed heads and fleeing bodies. Initially attracted by the way in which the thermodynamic device records the various infrared rays (heat waves) emitted by bodies, which vary according to their temperature, the artist was soon fascinated by a process that reduces human subjects to essential figures, devoid of superfluous characteristics or specificities.