SERGE GAINSBOURG

This Nikon F2 camera, serial number 7535958, is the very camera used during one of Serge Gainsbourg’s most iconic photo shoots. The shoot took place in 1984 in Pierre Terrasson’s studio at the Cité de la Maladrerie in Aubervilliers, as part of a commission for the French rock magazine *Best*. It was taken during Gainsbourg’s mature period, a few years after “Love on the Beat” (1984), and at a time when Terrasson was becoming one of the greatest portraitists on the French rock scene.

Terrasson recounts that during this black-and-white session for Best, Gainsbourg noticed the photographer’s Nikon F2 and struck up a conversation about photography and painting, as Terrasson had only just graduated from the Beaux-Arts. As Gainsbourg owned the same camera on Rue de Verneuil, Terrasson decided to photograph him with it, giving rise to a series in which “Serge with the Nikon F2” became not only the artist’s most iconic image, but also the symbol of a budding friendship.
In the video “Histoire d’une photo”, it is explained that following a session with photographer Jean-Yves Le Gras and a discussion about the Nikon F2, Terrasson then took several shots, with the camera under his chin, the camera in the act of taking a shot (the photograph presented and offered for sale with the camera), playing with the frame. The camera thus became a true extension of Gainsbourg’s face, making this image one of the artist’s most iconic and emblematic visual symbols. 

The Nikon F2 camera offered here is the very one that Pierre Terrasson used in 1984 to photograph Gainsbourg. This Nikon F2 camera and its 24mm F/2 lens are inseparable from this iconic portrait. Since then, this series of photographs has been printed and exhibited on numerous occasions at the most significant events centred on Serge Gainsbourg.

This is a professional black 24x36 Nikon F2 SLR camera, equipped with a viewfinder and an MD3 motor—a configuration that is rather emblematic of Nikon’s professional equipment from the 1970s and 1980s. Made of metal, fully mechanical and produced between 1971 and 1980, the F2 Photomic is renowned for its robustness and its titanium focal-plane shutter. 

To mark the 35th anniversary of Serge Gainsbourg’s death, this iconic camera has become inextricably linked with Serge Gainsbourg. It is being offered for sale with an artist’s proof signed by Pierre Terrasson in the bottom right-hand corner, dated 1989.

Dimensions: frame 51 × 41 cm, and camera body 15.25 × 9.8 × 6.5 cm