Des oiseaux, Nathalie Baetens

For this seventeenth title of the Collection Des oiseaux (On Birds), the French photographer Nathalie Baetens invites us to discover the micro-habitats of birds from all over the world. Small shacks, huts, thatched cabanas, little houses—their formal variety is both ingenious and aesthetic—suspended in mid-air or fastened securely to branches, or even hidden among thick foliage, the nests photographed by Nathalie Baetens are fascinating in their diversity and their delicateness. 

To accompany this visual corpus, a text by Fiona Meadows, architect and curator at the Cité de l'architecture et du patrimoine, explores the relationship between nest architecture and human architecture, at a time of major environmental and climatic challenges. An interview between Nathalie Baetens and Philippe Séclier, co-director of the Collection Des oiseaux (On Birds), looks back at the origins of the photographer's project and describes her special relationship with these micro-habitats.