For their Silent World project, Lucie & Simon painstakingly compose shots of famous urban tableaux from around the globe with just one or two forlorn people wandering through in a state of silent contemplation.

All other signs of life, from traffic to pedestrians have vanished, creating a strange tension between the intense urbanity of the setting and the solitude of the subjects. There is something far more affecting in these shots of Paris, New York, and Beijing than in the devastated NYC of films like I Am Legend.