In 1999, Pierre-Yves Mahe, founder of SPEOS photographic school, rented on the Gras estate,the part of the house where Niépce had located his laboratory-workshop in Saint-Loup de Varennes.
Pierre-Yves Mahe was the first photographer to occupy the place since the inventor’s death in 1833.The historical residence had remained unexplored until then,just gazed at from outside by some curious people.

The Gras estate.
Heliography by Niépce’s process
© Jean-Louis Marignier/speos.fr/Gamma

With Jean-Louis Marignier,a scientist at the CNRS (French National Center of Scientific Research ), they recreated Niépce’s working conditions,and with methodical diggings they rediscovered the site of his experiments.

> See our video about the well investigations  
* Download time : up to 4 minutes




The first photograph,
" point de vue de la fenetre"

Pierre-Yves Mahe and Jean-Louis Marignier, with a few years interval, went to the Harry Ransom Center in Austin (Texas ). Each one held in his hands the oldest photography in history,“Le point de vue de la fenêtre“,“view from the window“, shot in 1827 by Nicephore Niépce.
Both were deeply moved, and tried to follow Niépce’s traces and rediscovered the emotion of the man who made the first photograph.


Pierre-Yves Mahe and Jean-Louis Marignier startarcheological diggings in the old Niépce’s laboratory - workshop.

Attic of the house


To restore the room back to the conditions known by Niépce,different labs analyzed the covering of walls and floors.They confirmed Marignier’s theory, that supposed that the window from which “view from the window “ was shot ,had been positioned sideway by 70cms from todays’ window.
Lifting up the present floor boards,they found the actual floor on which Niépce used to walk,and also the exact position of the former window.


> See the illustrated restoration

> See our video about the shifted window  
> See our video about Niépce's house reconstitution on a computer  
* Download time : up to 4 minutes
> Lectures and introductions to our research






Jean-Louis Marignier and Pierre-Yves Mahe regularly present for specialized shows, the results of their findings about Nicephore Niépce.





The first public presentation of the restoration of Niépce’s house took place during the“Rencontres Internationales de la Photographie“ in Arles, in july 2000.

Presentation in the Antique Theater in Arles for RIP 2000.