Gilles Martin-Raget is one of the best photographers in the world. Take a look to those pictures from his Instagram profile to understand why… And discover more on his website
Gilles Martin-Raget bio
Discover more about Gilles Martin-Raget… in his own words!
My personal story started in Arles, south of France, April 9th 1955, a city full of incredible roman historical vestiges and now famous for its photo festival, located right in the heart of Provence, between Camargue and Alpilles landscapes, a nice little town full of historical culture, traditions and art de vivre.
I lived there for 19 years, eventually doing my photography debuts followed by the inevitable sessions in dark rooms to process B&W films. I then moved to Montpellier, then Aix en Provence for vague economic university purposes, a period who I more certainly start to discover the sea and the wonderfull hobby of sailing, followed by its next stop: yacht racing.
As journalism always was something of interest for me, I started to work for yachting magazines, reporting about the races I was participating in. Speaking about milestones, the very first photo I had the pleasure to publish was illustrating a story written by a lovely young female journalist whose name was Maguelonne Turcat. She eventually became my wife – hopefully still is!… – and we had 3 sons together. As she was form Marseille, we settled in Marseille, no choice, and are still living there in the lovely neighborhood of Endoume.
On the nautical side, I mainly sailed in the Mediterranean sea, aboard large racing and cruising monohulls, including maxi yachts, eventually reached the required level to be part of an America’s Cup Challenger trials crew onboard France III at Newport (RI) in 1983 with Bruno Troublé as skipper.
The French team was eliminated at the early stages of the trials, but I stayed in Newport to cover the historical win of Australia II, working for several sailing magazines. After another short campaign with “Challenge France” in Fremantle, Western Australia in 1986, it was time to become full time yachting journalist and marine photographer.
The America’s Cup being not only a fantastic feature but also an unescapable addiction, I’ve been covering since then every single edition, working for numerous top media organizations like AFP, L’Equipe and Liberation, then as Team photographer, including Oracle in 2007 in Valencia, 2010 with the incredible giant Trimaran winning affair, and finally as photo manager and principal photographer for the San Francisco big wing rigged foiling catamarans 2013 edition.
I am now lucky enough (yes, there is also an ugly amount of work involved) to be a regular contributor to most of the prominent sailing magazines throughout the world, the author of numerous books on sailing and sailors, official photographer for many top racing sailors or sailing teams, internationally known sponsors and race organizers. That also means a lot of travel to cover the greatest sailing events, do reports on most spectacular cruising destinations and sail onboard the most diverse yachts. As you can imagine, I love my job!
Gilles Martin-Raget Official website is here!