Photographs

Rob Rombout photographing a Barbary macaque sitting on a railing above the bay of Gibraltar — 2024, Gibraltar, Rob Rombout

“For more than thirty years, the Dutch filmmaker has travelled the roads of the world to capture fragments of reality through his many encounters. […] Rob Rombout is one of those filmmakers and photographers of insatiable curiosity who are forever setting out in search of the Other. His films are contemporary portraits that, encounter after encounter, assemble the fragmentary images that make up a country. […] These crossings shape his culture of the road, at the borders of the still and the moving image.”

Nathalie Dassa, “Rob Rombout, documenteur du monde”, Les Plats Pays, 20 January 2025. Translated from the French.

2020, Armação de Pêra, Portugal

A young woman with a fringe looking into the lens — 2013, Hanoi, Vietnam, Minh Minh Vu Hong

A Barbary macaque sitting against a pale sky — 2024, Gibraltar

A breaking wave off Pico — 2020, Pico, Portugal

A ridge of folded red rock under a pale sky — 2018, Little Karoo, South Africa

A tangle of bare, lichen-covered branches against a pale sky — 2026, Caldas de Monchique, Portugal

A covered market, the roof casting long stripes of shadow on the ground — 2017, Phnom Penh, Cambodia

A painted corner building on a street with snow — 2018, Montreal, Canada

A tiled courtyard seen from under a carved lattice — 2021, Marrakech, Morocco

A smiling woman in a pink checked headscarf — 2014, Sapa, Vietnam

An older man with a shaved head, half his face in shadow, against a black background — 2010, New York, USA, Tony Ndogo

A woman with green eyes and gold earrings, half lit, against a black background — 2011, Amsterdam, Montana, USA, Carly Danhof-Bellach

A man with round glasses and a dark high-collared jacket against a black background — 2013, Shanghai, China, Huang Jianhua

A closed bar front covered in graffiti, the sign reading Bar le Cinéma — 2019, Villeurbanne, France

Weathered fence posts, one painted with the word AMOR — 2023, Quito, Ecuador

A wall covered with handwritten messages and notes — 2018, Verona, Italy

An older man with white curly hair and a dark jacket, against a dark background — 2019, Villeurbanne, France, Robert Cahen

A young man with dark tousled hair looking into the camera, a blurred room behind him — 2023, Lisbon, Portugal, Luca

A young woman with long braids and pearl earrings, against a grey wall — 2018, Cotonou, Benin, Florida Zossoungbo

Trees and karst hills reflected in still water — 2018, Ninh Binh, Vietnam

Silhouettes of four people at the edge of the surf, seen from above — 2026, Nossa Senhora da Rocha, Portugal

Old sailing boats moored in a harbour under a grey sky — 2026, Rotterdam, Netherlands

Sunlight on the sea and on wet sand, a small figure in the distance — 2026, Caparica, Portugal