Biography

Originally from Reunion Island where he grew up, Jérôme Gence discovered the Himalayas at school thanks to traveling lecturers.

The mountain range became his childhood dream; a dream he realised in 2015 when he arrived in Nepal after more than a year of traveling from Paris. It was during this trip that he took his first photos. In Nepal, he met photographer Eric Valli who, touched by his early photographs, became his mentor.

In 2016, Jérôme had his first exhibition - 'The Himalayas - at the Atelier Yann Arthus Bertrand in Paris with the support of Canon France. Since then, he has been interested in the impact of the internet and other new technologies on the lives of the people he photographs.

In 2018 and 2019, his photo stories 'Livestreamers: The Geishas of The Internet' and 'Virtual Singers: I love a Hologram' have been screened at the annual Visa pour L’Image photo festival in Perpignan, France.

In 2020, Jérôme was invited as a speaker by the National Geographic Storyteller Summit in Washington. In the same year, he spoke at Google Talks to share his backgrounds as both data analyst and photographer.

In 2021, he won the Pierre & Alexandra Boulat 2020 Award for his project 'Telework' which has also been exhibited at Visa Pour l’Image and in 2022, he was given the National French Library Award for its project 'The Screen Generation'

Since then Jérôme's story 'Virtual Singers: I love a Hologram' was exhibited at the Open Your Eyes Festival in Zurich, Switzerland and his story 'The Screen Generation' was part of Visa pour l’Image,

His photo stories have been published in Le Figaro magazine, Paris Match, Stern, Der Spiegel, Le Monde, Die Zeit, Polka, 6 mois, National Geographic and many more.

Since 2022, Jérôme has been an official Canon Ambassador.