"This book is the result of an experiment conducted by François Bon with students at HEAD - Geneva. The experiment consisted, to put it with a bit of humour, of getting a dog and a cat to sit together in the same room, the dog being the text and the cat the photograph (or vice versa). The two don't always mix. In the history of photography, the place given to text raises questions. Their shared history is full of twists and turns, reproaches and misunderstandings, but also attempts at rapprochement. "You don't trust me enough" is the image's criticism of the text, and "Without me you're not credible" is the text's revenge. It's a sad vaudeville that it's certainly time to move beyond, and one that has been surpassed by artists who don't wait for anyone to give them the green light to try out the most unconventional hybrids. It was important to me that François Bon should lead this experiment. It needed a singular author to bring it to fruition, an author who wasn't afraid to cross bridges, even if it meant building them when they didn't exist; an author, above all, who understood and put into practice the idea that, without being identical, photography and writing bring out "the invisibility of the real" (he writes in his book Fragments du dedans). We don't photograph what we see, any more than we write about it. This is where photography meets writing. Both are performative acts that radically change the real, san We don't photograph what we see, any more than we write it down. This is where photography meets writing. Both are performative acts that radically change reality, with no turning back. This is what the students were confronted with during their week-long workshop. (Extract from the preface by Bruno Serralongue)