The American Years: Guillaume Zuili’s Cinematic Vision of the West

The American Years is French-born photographer Guillaume Zuili’s love poem to Los Angeles and the desert landscape of Joshua Tree. The exhibition chronicles nearly 25 years of the artist honing his craft as both a black and white film photographer and master printer.

Zuili stated, in the announcement; “Film Noir has always been my matrix, because cinema is my matrix. Photography came later, but it all started with movies.”

Zuili came to Los Angeles when his then American wife wanted to move back here, to LA. He never wanted to move to LA, but Zuili called it amazing because suddenly he “was in a huge movie set.”

It’s through his love of cinema, which stems from his childhood, that Zuili sees LA. He was profoundly influenced by the genre of film noir and has always seen photography in black and white. The photographer said he’s stuck in a time frame that he always looks for, from the 1940s to the 1970s; it’s what represents the U.S. the most.

Upon his arrival to LA at the end of 2001, Zuili worked with a press agency, which he still belongs to, doing many stories, portraits and assignments. Later, he worked as a correspondent for French magazines. The work eventually dried up around 2008 because of the state of the press when the big shift to digital happened. But another shift occurred for the photographer. Around 2006, after he had time to get a good grasp of Los Angeles, he developed his film noir series.

“The first few years I did nothing good. It started around 2006, when I found the right way to work with it, and after that it never ended. I found my way using [a] pin-hole [camera]. It erases detail and just gives you an idea.The key was to not show everything, to erase detail in a manner that when you see the image, you make the story. It was a tease.”

The pin-hole changed everything in Zuili’s journey because, at first, he had to resolve a lot of technical problems in order to make a good print, he explained. This is how he found lith printing, a process which enables him to achieve the high contrast and grainy shadows that make his Urban Jungle images so cinematic.

“It gave me amazing contrast, amazing blacks, and texture. The first time I saw those prints I couldn’t believe it. I fell in love. It changed my life as an artist because since 2006, I only do lith printing. It became my trademark. Suddenly it was not a photograph; it was more than that.”

He noted, taking the photo is not the most important part of what he does. Everything happens afterward, in the dark room where, Zuili said, he lives and can work whenever he wants. Developing his work takes a very long time. If he does four to five prints in a day he’s very happy. 

Just as Zuili has a talent for encapsulating this city precisely in his urban scenes, he sculpts    engrosing desert terrain masterfully, through his lens. In The American Years viewers will find familiar LA buildings, or surprises that Zuili, with a keen eye, captured at the exact right moment, such as his LAX  (2005, printed 2024). The silver gelatin print displays practically all one needs — on the surface — in a consumerist’s Los Angeles; parking, rent-a-car, music and entertainment, satellite football, dine-in/take-out, pool and darts, cupping and shiatsu massage, all found squeezed together in a portion of one block. Then, in what must have been a split second, a plane suspended above the citified commodities comes in for landing at LAX. There is so much in this image, notably absent of any humans, only cars on the street and the landmark Capital Records building stands in the distance. 

Zuili’s capturing of it is astonishing.

Windows presents a towering apartment building, double exposed in butter yellow. The edifice beckons the viewer through an upward gaze to multiple, vertical rows of casement windows, most of which are ajar, adding a surreal yet inviting sense to the structure. It’s another masterful work by Zuili that, through light and movement, invites the imagination to play.

The image is from an apartment building in Long Beach on the oceanfront. Zuili said he loves to do double exposure images.

With their warm sepia tones and minimal composition, the Joshua Tree series pays homage to classic American Westerns. Zuili was first drawn to Joshua Tree for his sanity when he was “freaking out in LA.” 

I found peace there because it’s a magical place, he said. “Then I started taking pictures there, but it’s a very hard place to take pictures because the sense of scale is very difficult to render. It’s a tricky place. After lots of time, I tried many directions and found the right way for me. It’s a place that I love and I go there at least once a month, for me and for my photography.”

In several images from his Joshua Tree series, in a photographic trick, Zuili presents a juxtaposition, capturing a massive desert expanse, presented entirely within frame. To this observation the photographer divulged, “And some of those boulders are very small.”

He noted the light is very important, and so is the time that you shoot it.

“Photography is about composition, lights, timing and point of view … you find a spot, wait for the good light and you wait for the moment to shoot,” he said. “There is no mystery about that. So you need to take time and this is why you keep going back to the right place and one day you have everything in the picture. It’s about watching, all the time, what’s going on.”

In particular, Zuili’s When the Sun Goes Down #5 depicts at least three rock formations, two of which appear to be boulders, all nestled together. The remarkable detail is the natural sunlight Zuili captured on one side of the biggest rock, as though the sun had just risen over a desert horizon.

Zuili called the contrast of scenes between the urban landscape and Joshua Tree, the yin and the yang. 

“It’s a good opposition and it represents the west, California. It’s very emblematic. I will always continue the urban and the desert landscapes but it may be elsewhere.”

Zuili said he is very happy he did this show and that he was approached to do it. 

“I was very touched by the feedback I got because it was [from] Angelenos [who] are native, born in LA,” he said. “Usually, they are very blasé, so the fact that they loved the way I photographed LA, it was very important for me to get that feedback.”

When his creativity is there, Zuili noted, he does not stop. He becomes like a machine and goes into the dark room.

“It’s amazing [then] suddenly it stops and you don’t know why,” he said. “You are dry and it can be for a few months. Then I’m relieved because I’m so exhausted. Then suddenly I become very pissed off and I try but it doesn’t work. Then … it comes back. We all have these processes.”

It may be his stubbornness that keeps him working like a machine. In any case, he credits it as both a strength and weakness. On that note, he shared advice given to him, when asked, from a mentor; he told Zuili the best thing is to not listen to any advice.

“I followed that by the book. I do it my way. I don’t care if people like it or not. It’s not easy but I like it.”

The Palos Verdes Art Center will host an artist talk with Zuili from 1 to 3 p.m., Oct. 11.

Next, Zuili has an upcoming show at solo. Gallery in San Pedro, opening Oct. 18.

Guillaume Zuili: The American Years

Time: 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday to Friday and Saturday 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Oct. 9 through Nov. 15 

Cost: Free

Details: 310-541-2479; pvartcenter.org

Venue: Palos Verdes Art Center, 5504 Crestridge Road, Rancho Palos Verdes