Helen Margaret Giovanello (General Studies ‘96) had her book project Chris and Wayne, the Unexpected Road presented by Sylvie Hugues at the Maison Européenne de la Photographie (MEP) in Paris on October 9, as one of the 10 portfolios of the year.
Helen said about the project:
"In 1997, in Spanish Harlem, I met Chris and Wayne. They were living on the streets, at the heart of a community marked by poverty, addiction, and the AIDS epidemic. The first time we met, Chris looked at me and said, “You and your camera, get lost.” I respected her words. Then I waited. Slowly, a relationship of trust began to grow.
"For four years, I shared their daily lives, as well as those of the women and men living on the streets of my neighbourhood. As my first long-term documentary project, The Unexpected Road laid the foundations of a photographic practice built on time, human connection, and trust.
"Twenty years later, I found Wayne again. He welcomed me as an old friend. This reunion opened a second chapter, revealing what the project had been about from the very beginning: the strength of human bonds, the possibility of transformation, and the time it takes for a life to unfold in all its complexity."
Helen also co-curated and is exhibiting in a group show titled Strates de l’intime (Strata of Intimacy ) at Galerie Mémoire de l’Avenir, presented as part of the Paris Photo Week OFF programme. The exhibition runs from November 12 to 15, 2026, with a public opening on Thursday, November 12, from 6 to 9 p.m. It brings together five photographers, Maja Bialon, Giovanni Del Brenna, Isabelle Desvignes, Brian du Halgouet, and Helen, whose series Konenki, the Invisible Ageexplores the transformation of the feminine. Together, the works examine how memory, love, absence, and transformation build up in layers, like geological strata.
An Italian-British photographer born in London and raised in Turin, Helen trained at ICP and has spent nearly thirty years developing a body of work that is both documentary and deeply intimate. Her immersive approach blends a social gaze, a spiritual quest, and artistic commitment, weaving a sensitive visual language made of textures, rhythms, and resonances. From Spanish Harlem to Uganda, from Kamathipura to the Atlantic Ocean, her projects explore humanity in its fractures and its light. Her work has been published in The New York Times, Le Monde, and Newsweek, among others, and exhibited internationally in Turin, Paris, New York, and Tokyo. Alongside her photographic practice, she is co-curator of exhibitions and content at Galerie Mémoire de l’Avenir in Paris and participates in portfolio reviews at IMMIXgalerie during Paris Photo days.
Images by Helen Margaret Giovanello
Helen Margaret Giovanello
