In 1933, Georges Simenon, the author of the famous cycle about the Commissar Maigret, visited Odessa. A keen photographer, Simenon took many pictures on the streets of the city. At that time, Simenon was not yet a famous writer, but was considered a popular journalist: he had interviews with Gandhi, Hitler, Mussolini and Trotsky. And the purpose of the trip to Odessa was also professional: shooting and writing reports for Parisian publications.

Both in literature and in his photographs, Georges Simenon was the original and the master! At the first glance at the pictures it seems that they were taken unprofessionally, even with some carelessness... But gradually, page after page, you begin to feel, comprehend the gaze of an experienced reporter and connoisseur of life.

The objects that the writer photographed are most striking. These are ordinary people. The album contains many pictures of those who were, so to speak, "at the bottom" of society - vagabonds and beggars. But most of all, Simenon loved to photograph beautiful girls! Landscapes, architecture, historical monuments and other sights of the countries he visited, he was not very interested ... In the foreground there was always a man!