Robert Polidori: Versailles

We’ve despatched New York-based photographer Robert Polidori to Casablanca and Bangkok on Wallpaper* assignments but his latest, personal project was an altogether more regal affair.

See more of Versailles through Polidori's eyes

Twenty-five years in the making, Polidori has painstakingly captured various elements under restoration in Versailles. The 18th century palace has recently undergone a process of mummification; the hardening of its decorative elements against the wear and tear of the 3 million visitors it receives each year.

Polidori’s pictures are as much an exercise in still life photography as a comment on the notion of restoration. Exquisite and opulent subject matter, photographed in painstaking detail, makes you wonder if restoration is anything more than maquillage of a contemporary culture, rather than the preservation of the past: ‘historical revisionism and present society’s superego’ as Polidori suggests.

18 November 2008 | Design