"I like a sense of ambiance. I have a good rapport with the models, I always make them feel comfortable. I like my job, so it does not seem difficult. I like challenges."

To the question whether photography is reductionist, in the sense that among many possibilities the choice is exclusionary, it is a "process of subtraction," materialized in a very narrow angle of what is in front of the lens, Demarchelier agrees: "It is always question of choice. We work on an option, we have to work on the action, very fast. It goes as it goes. I love action. This is the main problem with young photographers, they do not know what to choose. Many young photographers today seem afraid to make choices. They are confused. The importance of choices is fundamental. This is the key and the worst problem. One has to make his own choice, and very quickly."

Photographs of beautiful women, naked or scantily dressed (men and celebrities never are): the trapping of beauty, is there sexism here? A thorny issue, but we could hint otherwise: The women are beautiful because it is Demarchelier who makes them so. The best example could be Lady Diana on the cover and in a spread in a December 1996 Bazaar, we do not remember of having seen her so beautiful, almost radiant, poised yet natural, and looking younger than ever. Another key to is that we need glamour, and glamour does not come from Hollywood any longer. Only a few of the best fashion photographers can give us glamour. Amy Spindler of the New York Times has written that photos are every man's passport to high fashion, as close as many will get: "couture has reached masses through photographs."

The worst thing that could happen to Patrick Demarchelier is to photograph still lifes, he cherishes movement. The bare woman hanging from a tree on the cover of his most recent book (Photographs, Bullfinch Press) is perfectly still, but it is one of these decisive moments when motion is frozen. Of course, there are many photographs in the book and in the Tony Shafrazi gallery that may appear static, but it is just that the subject is posing. There are photographs of trees, but trees are alive, and, yes, there is the photograph of a rock in the book, but perhaps it is a magic rock-it looks like it can be upturned. (Or, as in the saying: the exception that upholds the rule).

We think that Demarchelier does not care, he'd rather spend a weekend with his beloved family, perhaps showing them his most recent photos of animals. In Chaos Demarchelier can find beauty-another most pressing issue in today's physics is the search for order and harmony in the whole universe.