From: Alan Greene (hobbyhorsedada@hotmail.com)
Date: 12/08/02-08:27:27 PM Z
At sites under the jurisdiction of the French government ("monuments
historiques"), if you use a tripod you are automatically considered a
"professional photographer" rather than a "tourist" or "amateur" and then
quickly harassed. I was stopped from using a 5x7 one time in the parc
Saint-Cloud (former stomping ground of Victor Regnault and Louis Robert) and
prevented from using a 35mm camera with a tripod in the musée de l'armée.
The moral: la liberté est une chose relative--stay away from large touristic
parks, museums, historical monuments, and dog fesces. Far away from Paris,
things appear to be a bit more laissez-faire. It would be interesting to
know if the date of the implementation of this self-defeating and greedy
policy coincides with Paris's decline as the so-called capital of the
art-world.
But in all fairness to the Fifth Republic, things are not much better in the
land of the free. A few months back, I wanted to take an old-time style
picture in the interior of the Old North Church in Boston. That was fine
with the directors of the church--just so long as I understood that
photographs of the steeple were forbidden, since it was a registered
trademark. Suffice it to say that I found the idea of a trademark being
applied to a church steeple so ridiculous that I decided to forego the
interior shot.
Alan Greene
>From: ARTHURWG@aol.com
>Reply-To: alt-photo-process-l@sask.usask.ca
>To: alt-photo-process-l@sask.usask.ca
>Subject: Re: Safe Photographic Projects/tripods
>Date: Sun, 08 Dec 2002 16:19:59 -0500 (EST)
>
>.... and while we're on the subject, what about tripod use in France? A
>friend of mine was using a pinhole camera on a tripod (in the Luxembourg)
>and
>a policeman told him it was forbidden. What's the general policy in France
>regarding tripod use? Arthur
_________________________________________________________________
MSN 8 helps eliminate e-mail viruses. Get 2 months FREE*.
http://join.msn.com/?page=features/virus
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : 01/31/03-09:31:25 AM Z CST