Têtu : le magazine des gay et lesbiennes

I found this photograph above on Facebook of a man recreating the front cover of Island Life – an iconic Grace Jones record.

It caught my eye, firstly because I love Grace Jones and think she’s an excellent and exciting singer, but secondly because the model has a fucking great arse! Then I discovered the model was on Twitter @zefrog, and he was French, and he was gay, and he lived in London. BOOM! So I set to work on tracking Nicolas down and chatting to him about his own island life.

D’accord. Let’s get started…

GFL #001

Name: Nicolas Chinardet

Profession: Web Manager and Photographer

Age: 38

Moved to London: 2000AD

Residency: Elephant & Castle (Zone 1, South)

Origins: Vaux sous Aubigny (village 50k from Dijon)

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Hi Nicolas! First of all, TÊTU loves the Island Life pose, it’s very Grace-ful!

Thank you. The photo is a self-portait and part of an online project in which people recreate famous photographs from pop culture.

So tell me, what was it like growing up gay in rural France in the 1980s?

My childhood was uneventful and somewhat untypical for the French countryside. Fairly early on it became apparent that I was different and other kids weren’t nasty about it but they weren’t all that welcoming either. As soon as I learnt to read I took refuge in books, reading any novel that came my way. I only looked up when I got to university a decade later and by then, years spent in my own head hadn’t prepared me well for socialising. To this day I am very much the loner, despite my best efforts.

Describe the gay scene in Dijon. Was it la vie en rose?

It wasn’t very developed. By the time I left, there were a couple of night bars, a few gay-friendly restaurants and a club called L’an-fer ran a gay night on a… Sunday.

What does L’an-fer mean – the “year of something”?

It’s a bad pun. It means Iron Year but also sounds like the French word “enfer” which means hell. Daft Punk played there before they were famous, and Carl Cox appeared a couple of times. It was pretty cool I guess, the interior looked like a Parisian metro station. Laurent Granier started his career there too, he was really big in France then. I also met my first attempt at a boyfriend there!

So how come you moved to London?

So I ended up studying English which means visiting a native-speaking country was always at the back of my mind. The first time I came here I visited this guy from my neck of the woods in France who’d moved out here a few years previously. He was working, so I spent the week wandering around on my own and as corny as it sounds, I fell in love with the place. London has a chaotic energy, I love its vibe. I remember a feeling of relief, it was almost physical, like a weight had been take off my shoulders, at finally arriving here in London. I stayed in France for a few more years and had to complete ten months of national service, then I pretended to myself that I was going to stay in France and become a teacher. It was on a July morning in 2000 that I got in my car, filled it to the gills with all my stuff and made my way to the big smoke! I haven’t looked back.

You’re quite well regarded as a photographer of men. Did you photograph any back in France?

Photographing men is something I have only started doing very recently, after joining the Gay Photographers Network. I don’t see myself as professional though, I’m an “amateur tog”. I only really discovered photography in 2002 after I bought a small compact digital camera for a trip to Sydney with the London Gay Mens Chorus. Before that I was interested but somehow my pictures were always rubbish with an old-fashioned film camera. Photography seems to be taking centre-stage at the moment but it’s just one of my creative outlets. It’s hard to find models and I’m at the point where I could do with a studio. I like to write for magazines occasionally and I’m also in London’s gay reading group which I have been moderating for 11 years now.

So you were a member of the London’s Gay Mens Chorus – very prestigious! Did you encourage them to sing anything French?

They don’t need encouragement, The Chorus is musically quite adventurous and we sung in a variety of languages, including Polish, Catalan, Italian, German and of course French, several times.

You also work for an anti-smoking charity. Do the French smoke more than the English?

Yes, the UK has some of the best tobacco control regulations in the world but I think France is catching up.

What do you miss most about France?

The longer I stay in London the fewer reasons I have to go back to France, I don’t miss any of it. London is home for me now.

Which sights in London would you recommend to a French visitor?

London caters for virtually all tastes, apart perhaps for sun-lovers. Sometimes the best fun is just walking around the place and observing what is happening.

Do you miss Dijon mustard?

No, they sell it everywhere here.

Thanks Nicolas!
Find more photos and news from Nicolas on his website: www.zefrog.eu

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TÊTU ARTICLE OF THE DAY: Expo photos: la prostitution masculine du Paris ancien – A fantastic photograph has been unearthed of a gay brothel in 1920s Paris.

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Image Credits: 1) Grace Jones Island Life, self-portrait shot in London 2) Self-portrait 3) Portrait of Nicholas by Adrian Lourie 4) Naked scarf portrait of Nicholas, a collaborative project by Nicolas and Manel Ortega.

Follow Frère Jack on Twitter @jackcullenuk