Jean-Marie Périer

Born in Neuilly in 1940, Jean-Marie Périer spent his childhood at the home of his father, the actor Francois Périer.

He began his photographer’s career in 1956, as assistant to Daniel Filipacchi, who was a photographer for Marie-Claire magazine. He worked for him until 1960. During the same period, he also worked as photographer for “Jazz magazine,” “Paris-Match” and “Tele 7 Jours” (TV 7 Days). Then he signed up for military service, and went to Algeria.
From 1962 to 1974, he took photographs for the newspaper “Salut les Copains” (Hello Buddies), where he met all the main musicians and artists of the 1960s. He recalls the period as one of happiness and freedom, marked by a carelessness that no longer exists.

On January 1, 1980, he left for the United States, carrying a demo reel of his advertising work. He lived there for 10 years, directing more than 600 advertising shorts for a wide variety of labels, ranging from Ford Motors to Coca-Cola.

During this time, he made three shorts for an anti-drugs public awareness campaign. In 1986, “Drugs are crap” – a film Jean-Marie Périer considers useful, even after it was strongly criticized by some; in 1987, he filmed another short made with the help of Michel Platini; and in 1990 it’s the young, then unknown, Puerto Rican actor Benicio del Toro who embodies the fight against drugs.
He also made a film for Perce-niege to help Lino Ventura’s wife in her charitable action in favor of handicapped people. Jean-Marie Périer likes to talk about these short films as he’s proud of having made them.

Since then, he has lived between Los Angeles and Europe, taking photographs for various publications, including Elle, Paris-Match and Figaro-Magazine.
He has recently published two books of his photographs from the 1960s: “My 1960s” (the second volume was published in 1999) by Filipacchi Editions.
Today, Jean-Marie Périer wants to make movies once again -at least one film with Jacques Dutronc-and to continue writing…