This series is not a tribute or an ode to the United States.

From a young age, I have felt a deep curiosity for the country. Having been born and raised in Paris, my understanding of America was shaped entirely by its social and cultural references: American Pie, Bruce Weber’s sun-drenched bodies, Abercrombie & Fitch campaigns, teen comedies, beach parties, and the illusion of a carefree youth wrapped in denim and patriotism.

I didn’t just want to visit the United States. I wanted to embody its glory.

I do come to realize now that this dream was manufactured, constructed through movies, ads, and music videos, that almost served as propaganda and sold to the rest of the world as reality. When I finally experienced America for myself, camera in hand, ready to capture such glory, I was left disoriented. In front of me, were fragments of what seemed like a divided country, built entirely on contradictions and myths. I sensed only faint echoes and remnants of what I had grown up on. My photographs depict the Americans I thought I knew. Not to mock them nor to glorify them but to mourn this feeling of first impressions.

These images are exaggerated but no more than the imagery that shaped my imagination for years. The flags, the baseball caps, the bare torsos and wide smiles are all part of a visual language I inherited without ever truly understanding it.

I do not celebrate the U.S. This is how I of process the disillusionment. A personal and naïve attempt to capture the dream I never got to live, and that maybe no longer exists.

This is my goodbye to an America that never was.