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Swimming Pool: Franck Bohbot's documentation of public swimming baths

We confess. We're a little obsessed with New York-based French photographer Franck Bohbot and his eye for the theatrical. His series Swimming Pool serves as a typological map of his birthplace of Paris, tracing the aesthetic contours of the public swimming pool from one end of the city to the other, from turn of the century futurist stylings to minimalist modern designs.

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All images copyright and courtesy of Franck Bohbot

All images copyright and courtesy of Franck Bohbot

As described on his website: "A sociological and artistic exploration of this democratic space of leisure, the series celebrates the presence of these aquatic oases in a land-locked metropolis and asks what a place of play becomes once its players leave. In each brightly lit space encompassing a unique convergence of air and water, the absence of human activity assumes a distinct presence; the stillness reverberates, the silence echoes. The interiors are at once familiar and unfamiliar, their ordinary and utilitarian qualities transformed after hours into something far more dreamily cinematic, abound in hypnotic symmetries, and chlorinated blues of every shade."

You can almost smell the chlorine and hear the echoes of children laughing and splashing. View more of Bohbot's work at Frankbohbot.com.

Symmetrical indoor swimming pool with blue lanes bordered by pale cream walls, two levels of blue and white viewing galleries running along both sides, and recessed ceiling lights
Empty public swimming pool with serene turquoise water, flanked by rows of navy blue changing cubicles and illuminated by a geometric glass ceiling
Symmetrical view down the length of an empty public swimming pool with lane dividers, flanked by changing cubicles on both levels and lit by ceiling panels
A symmetrical indoor swimming pool with bright yellow vaulted ceiling sections and white arched beams, empty of people with lane dividers running down the length of the water
A symmetrical indoor swimming pool with six lanes separated by coloured lane dividers, bathed in bright natural light from ceiling windows, with empty changing areas visible on either side
Interior of a Parisian public swimming pool with turquoise water, lane dividers and an arched glass ceiling with geometric framework, empty of swimmers
A symmetrical indoor swimming pool with multiple lane dividers, enclosed by a glass ceiling and surrounded by multi-storey balconied galleries painted in pale blue and cream
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