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Calvin World Forty portraits on five continents

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On the occasion of the 500th anniversary of John Calvin, photographer Nicolas Righetti and journalist Pierre Grosjean traveled the world to meet forty Calvins, women and men, living on five continents. From Switzerland to Brazil via Cameroon, these Calvins of all ages have revealed themselves to the camera and the interview. They do not all claim to be the Reformer, but each expresses in their own way a rich identity marked by the seal of an individualism of which Calvin was one of the main promoters. Looks to discover in Calvin World, a book and an exhibition at the International Museum of the Reformation.

Some pictures

Each of the people presented is photographed using a particularly elaborate staging by Nicolas Righetti, in a very carefully defined architectural and environmental context. The special care devoted to the image is fundamentally a tribute to the men, women and children who agreed to entrust themselves with this project. In his work as a journalist, Pierre Grosjean is inhabited by the same empathy. Through short and accomplished texts, the intimacy of the Calvins is revealed, without neglecting its place in a broader… and sometimes Calvinist context. Pierre Grosjean takes the opportunity to recall, when the resonance lends itself to it, a significant feature of the figure of the Reformer of Geneva or of the movement he sparked.

Nicolas Righetti, Photographer

Born in Geneva in 1967, he first obtained a diploma in education at the Institute of Social Studies. After studying social and audiovisual sciences at the Beaux Arts in Geneva, he became an independent photographer and worked for numerous Swiss newspapers such as L’Hebdo, Le Temps, NZZ, Am Sonntag, Sonntag Blick Magazine and international newspapers, La Repubblica, Le Monde , Newsweek, The New York Times, The New Yorker.


His travels around the world, particularly in Asia, aroused in him an interest in megalomaniac and totalitarian political figures. He traveled to North Korea several times for his film “Guided Tour in North Korea” for which he won the First Prize for Quality in 2003 in Geneva.

He produced a photographic book “The Last Paradise in North Korea” (Olizane, 2003 and Umbrage, 2003). This work was also rewarded with the Swiss Press Photo First Prize in the international category in 2004. His images of Turkmenistan earned him the World Press Photo First Prize in the “Portrait story” category in 2007, then a book in 2008 “Love Me Turkmenistan” (Trolley Book and Labor and Fides). In 2009 he produced the book “Calvin World” for Editions Labore et Fides in Geneva, the Calvin photos were selected for the EWZ selection-Award in Zurich in 2010.


Pierre Grosjean, Journalist

Born in Neuchâtel in 1963, he studied business management. He worked as a journalist for Le Nouveau Quotidien, then Le Temps, for which he became responsible for the Internet and Media sections. Since 1999, together with Gabriel Sigrist, he has managed the online magazine Liamge.com and the press agency LargeNetwork in Geneva.

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