nantes cathedral Archives - IJM Photography

I want to talk about a blog I really like. It posts beautiful black and white photographs, one at a time, with barely a word of explanation. The photos come from all over the world — a rainy Chicago waterfront, a Nubian village on the banks of the Nile, a Roman basilica glowing with chandeliers, the streets of Washington D.C. — but they share a certain quality. They don’t try to explain themselves. They just sit there and let you look.

The blog is called Monochromia, and I have the privilege of being one of its guest contributors. I want to make that clear upfront: this is not my project. But it’s one I admire enough to write a fan letter about.

What Monochromia is

Monochromia is a collective photography blog. A community of photographers from around the world each post one image at a time — black and white, minimal words, maximum image. There’s no theme beyond the monochrome constraint. The result is something genuinely surprising: a feed that moves from a marble sculpture in a Smithsonian museum to a woman in a doorway on the Nile without a moment’s awkwardness. The common language is light and shadow, and it turns out that’s enough.

Nubian woman in a doorway, Upper Egypt, Nikon Zf — *Silent Observations* — a Nubian village on the Nile, Upper Egypt. Nikon Zf, 200mm. By Marcus Puschmann / Streets of Nuremberg. On Monochromia.

The photographers

What strikes me most is the range of voices. Marcus Puschmann, who blogs at Streets of Nuremberg, shoots documentary street photography on a Nikon Zf, with a sensitivity to available light that makes his portraits feel utterly unposed. The Northern Visions Media photographer shoots everywhere from Chicago waterfronts to wherever the day takes him, and thinks nothing of swapping his Canon 5D for an iPhone when the rain makes the decision for him — a reminder that the eye matters more than the tool. Then there are contributors who bring an entirely different sensibility: one recent post featured a marble sculpture of Lady Macbeth at the Smithsonian, shot on a Nikon Z8, with a caption that read like a short essay. Another showed the interior of a Roman basilica lit up for a wedding, processed as HDR, every column and chandelier rendered in luminous grey. And Charly Senall at charlysenall.wordpress.com brings a quieter, more contemplative eye — seascapes and landscapes where the absence of colour is the whole point.

Chicago waterfront on a rainy day, iPhone 16 Pro — *Tethered* — Chicago waterfront on a rainy day. iPhone 16 Pro. By Northern Visions Media. On Monochromia.

What the constraint does

Every photographer on Monochromia has made the same fundamental decision: to remove colour from the conversation. That sounds simple, but it changes everything. Colour is generous with information — it tells you the time of day, the season, roughly where in the world you are, whether the light is artificial or natural. Strip it away and what’s left is shape, tone, texture, and the relationship between them. The viewer has to do more work. They have to actually look.

The minimal-text policy does the same thing from a different angle. Most photography online arrives inside a story — a caption, a backstory, a geotag, a mood. Monochromia offers almost none of that. Just the image and maybe a line or two. Which means the photograph either stands on its own or it doesn’t. That’s a much harder test than most of us put our own work through.

Lady Macbeth marble sculpture, Smithsonian American Art Museum — *Out, Damnet Spot* — Lady Macbeth by Elisabet Ney, 1905. Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington D.C. Nikon Z8, 135mm. On Monochromia.

My small corner of it

I contribute the occasional image from France — film photographs mostly, from the Nikon FE or the Pentax ME Super, sometimes digital work from the Canon 6D Mark II. My most recent post was shot inside Nantes Cathedral, one of the first times I’d been back inside since the 2019 fire. It’s a small contribution to a large and genuinely international conversation, and I’m glad to be part of it.

What Monochromia has done for me personally is make me more honest about my own work. Here on IJM Photography, a good story can carry a weaker image. On Monochromia, there is no story — just the photograph. If it holds, it holds. If it doesn’t, that’s useful information too.

Nantes Cathedral interior, Nikon FE, Ilford HP5+ — *Nantes Cathedral* — Nikon FE, Ilford HP5+. One of my first shots inside since the 2019 fire. On Monochromia.

Go and have a look

If you enjoy black and white photography — whether you shoot it yourself or just appreciate it — Monochromia is worth bookmarking. It posts multiple times a week, the standard is consistently high, and the range of subjects and styles means there’s always something unexpected. It’s a good reminder that monochrome isn’t a retro affectation or a post-processing shortcut. It’s a distinct way of seeing the world, and there are a lot of people around the world who see it that way.

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I didn’t set foot in the cathedral while Voyage en hiver draped its silence in municipal spectacle. Not out of protest—I simply couldn’t bear to see sacred space turned into a backdrop. So I waited. And when the banners finally came down in December, I loaded a roll of Ilford HP5 into my Nikon FE and walked back in—not as a tourist, not as a patient, but as someone hoping to find the light exactly where I’d left it.

I’ve always abhorred political recuperation. The Voyage en Hiver had no place in the cathedral’s reopening. This was about worship. About returning to God in a space that had been quiet for too long—not about municipal branding or winter tourism. “Give unto Caesar what belongs to Caesar, and unto God what belongs to God.” (Matthew 22:21)

That day, I chose God’s silence over their spectacle.

My hands were cold when I raised the camera. December light in a stone cathedral is a quiet thing—more absence than presence. I wondered, honestly, if 400 ASA would be enough. But I wanted authenticity: more grain than digital noise, more truth than polish. So I trusted the FE’s metering, opened up my aperture, and let the film do what it does best. No second-guessing. No LCD screen. Just the click of the shutter and the hope that the light would hold.

And it did.

The frames that emerged are darker than summer would allow—but this was December, after all. And in that darkness, something gentle remains: the grain cradling the texture of worn wooden pews, shadows tracing the ribs of vaulted stone, candlelight bleeding softly into halos where no banner now hangs. Black and white stripped away every distraction—the logos, the seasonal clutter, the noise—until only what mattered remained: light on stone, silence between pillars, the architecture of reverence.

One frame in particular stays with me: the candles. Shot at 1/30s, my hands unsteady not from illness but from the simple weight of the moment. The focus slipped slightly. The flames blurred into one another. And instead of frustration, I felt a quiet relief—the film hadn’t captured perfection. It had captured presence. Grain became breath. Blur became prayer.

I didn’t go to “get out of the house.” I went because the space was clean again—just stone, silence, and the stubborn glow of candlelight. And for a few minutes, with the FE cold against my palm and the smell of incense in the air, I remembered why I love film photography: it doesn’t lie. It holds what’s there—shadows and all—and asks only that you trust the process.