François Hollande and His Watch Worn Backwards

The snapshot went viral. The new President of the French Republic trying to tell the time on a watch whose dial was on the opposite side of his wrist became a source of mockery.

As we know, the first days of a presidency are the most important, and François Hollande could certainly have done without this photo that made the front page of Le Point, at a time when his detractors were casting doubt on his ability to hold the highest office—just as the President‘s watch can sometimes spark debate.

Henri Cartier-Bresson said, “To criticise is to put yourself in the other person’s shoes and try to understand what they wanted to do.”

So let’s look at the circumstances behind this rather amusing shot. And yes, like it or not, a blog isn’t just an Instagram feed of raw, uncaptioned images optimised for SEO, copy-and-pasted brand press releases, or 140-character posts sprinkled with hashtags …

 Photographer Goffredo di Crollalanza looks back on his photo:

“It was last week; his partner was waiting for him at the restaurant, he stopped by his place, so I followed him.” I was quite far away because the street was blocked by the police. Two other photographers were with me, but they didn’t have long enough lenses; they couldn’t see that from that distance. Today, with the number of pixels, you can crop a lot; the photo on the cover of Point is actually a quarter of the original shot.

He realised it was upside down; it was pretty funny. I didn’t think it would cause such a stir.

My boss was very happy. Journalists mentioned that photo to me again today because it’s making the rounds on Facebook”.

A lot of fuss over not very much …