La Cantine

Cyril Cavalié was born in Antananarivo, Madagascar, on November 26, 1973.

In 1994, upon graduating with a degree in economics and law, he immediatly began working in press, first as a graphic designer, next as a copy editor, then as a journalist.

He began his carrer in photojournalism in 2000, with a photo essay on the social experiment of Burning Man, in the Nevada desert, published extensively, winning worldwide acclaim around the globe for his coverage.

Day after day, he has dedicated his photographic carreer to documenting the social and political questions that define our times, covering stories about utopia, temporary autonomous zones and new urban phenomenons, becoming known as an astute chronicler of contemporary social issues.

Since five years, he has started documenting events linked to topics which are generating unremitting debates (cctv, advertising, nuclear power, gmo...), and to their direct consequence, the rise of new contesting forms, with a special emphasis on events in Europe.

In 2006, he joined Luna, an association of photographers, with whom he created Lunatic, an online photo magazine dedicated to contemporary photojournalism.

In 2008, he has been arrested by the Belgium police, while doing his job, taking pictures in a public area next to NATO headquarters, and kept prisoner in Brussel for seven hours, inside a tiny cell with five people. A discretionary detention he amazingly succeeded in shooting to testify against arbitrariness.

A few months later, he quitted Luna, starting point of producing socially-relevant stories under his own, while working on portrait photography and press commissions.

On July 14th 2009, national feast day in France, he has been violently strangulated and lightly wounded by some officials of the French police force, as he was once more reporting in a public area, just shooting the French Clown Army's traditional march past. Challenged and taken off in two different police stations, he brought an action against his assailants at once in a third police station. An interference with freedom, and above all a serious interference with press freedom, revealed by AFP news agency.

Cyril Cavalié's work as a journalist and as a freelance photographer has appeared in numerous magazines worldwide.

He is the co-author of a book, with French reporter Sébastien Porte, which summarizes his engagement: "The New Art of Protesting — Happenings, Festive Campaigns and Direct Action".

— L.C.