Photographer Paul Clemence has unveiled a new photo series documenting Le Corbusier's Notre Dame du Haut in Ronchamp, France. The collection revisits one of the 20th century's most influential works of religious architecture through an exploration of light, materiality, and atmosphere, highlighting the sculptural qualities of the chapel and the changing relationship between its concrete surfaces and natural illumination. Combining black-and-white exterior photographs with color interior images, the series presents a new documentation of a building that continues to shape architectural discourse more than seven decades after its completion.
Completed in 1955, Notre Dame du Haut was commissioned to replace the pilgrimage chapel destroyed during the Second World War. Located atop Bourlémont Hill in eastern France, the project marked a significant departure from the formal vocabulary associated with many of Le Corbusier's earlier works. Rather than the rational, orthogonal compositions of his Purist period, the chapel is defined by thick curving masonry walls, an asymmetrical concrete roof, and irregularly placed openings that respond to both the surrounding landscape and the rituals of pilgrimage. Its sculptural form, together with its integration into the hilltop site, has established Ronchamp as one of the defining works of twentieth-century religious architecture.
Drawing inspiration from Le Corbusier's observation that "Architecture is the learned game, correct and magnificent, of forms assembled in the light," Clemence approached Notre Dame du Haut as an opportunity to examine how light defines architectural form. Rather than focusing solely on its iconic silhouette, the photographer turned his attention to the building's tactile qualities, capturing how daylight reveals the material depth of its surfaces. "One of the elements that really surprised me was the textures of the walls," Clemence explains. "It gives a certain primordial solidity to the building that we don't often associate with it." His images emphasize the rough concrete surfaces and the shifting play of shadow across the chapel's curved volumes, revealing a material richness often overshadowed by its sculptural presence. The series also extends to the nearby Pyramid of Peace, designed by Le Corbusier using rubble from the original chapel destroyed during the war, highlighting a lesser-known element that reinforces the site's layered history of destruction, reconstruction, and remembrance.
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Exterior images were presented in black and white to emphasize geometry, texture, and shadow, while the interior photographs retain the subtle chromatic qualities created by the chapel's stained-glass windows. The resulting sequence reflects two complementary readings of the project: one rooted in the expressive qualities of concrete and form, the other in the ephemeral character of light. Reflecting on the completed series, Clemence references Nicholas Fox Weber's biography of Le Corbusier, in which the author writes that the architect "transformed rough concrete into an expression of bounteous hope" and "captured pure light as if it had mass." The passage, the photographer notes, resonated with his own experience after completing the work.
Through his photographic practice, Paul Clemence has continued to document architecture across a wide range of contexts, from historic landmarks to contemporary cultural and urban projects. His recent work includes Zaha Hadid Architects' International Gateway Centre in Hong Kong, Heatherwick Studio's West Bund Orbit in Shanghai, and Ruy Ohtake's Bioparque Pantanal in Campo Grande. Across these projects, Clemence explores the relationship among architecture, landscape, infrastructure, and public experience, focusing on how buildings are shaped by their surroundings and perceived through movement, materiality, and light.
