René-Jacques French, 1908-2003

René Giton studied law in 1925–1926 and began a career as a writer before giving it up to become a photographer-illustrator in 1932, under the pseudonym René-Jacques. His photographs were published, among other places, in the Photographie supplement of Arts et Métiers Graphiques in 1933, and his first solo exhibition took place in the lobby of the Studio 28 cinema the following year. He illustrated several books, the first of which was Envoûtement de Paris (1938) by Francis Carco. In 1945, René-Jacques founded the Advertising and Illustration Photographers section within the Union of Advertising Graphic Designers. In 1946, he became a member of the Group of Fifteen (Groupe des XV). Thanks to the opening of his Paris studio the following year, he went on to have a career as an advertising, illustration, and press photographer.