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Few people in politics can claim to have been nearly struck by lightning, or (more dangerously still) been told to “get lost” by Madonna. But as LANA GALEA found out, Swieqi councillor Rene Rossignaud is no ordinary local politician…
It was love at first strike: the kind of experience that happens almost by accident, and shapes your future career before you even know it.
 “At 16, I took a shot from the roof of my house of a lightning bolt hitting a block of apartments which is about 100 metres away, with my dad screaming from his bedroom,” Rene Rossignaud recalls. The same photo was published on the front page of The Malta Independent, and ended up landing him his big break as a photographer. It also earned him a nickname: “storm-chaser”, which he would later justify by getting one of his best-known photos – a shot of the Portomaso tower struck by lightning – published in the National Geographic.
“When I was a kid, I’d be on the roof watching the lightning coming down. I was never scared of it,” he says about the inspiration behind his choice of career. But it was only after enrolling in an arts course at 16 that Rene realised his passion for actually shooting storms.
“It’s better than shooting the prime minister on a Sunday morning!” he laughs when asked about the attraction of this somewhat dangerous hobby. “It’s like an adventure: you’re out in the open, battling through the storm, driving around, trying to find the right spot. And it’s exciting, because you know you can get struck any moment. That’s the fun part of it. You’re standing in the middle of a field on the highest point of the island, and you know that this thing could come down and you can say bye-bye to everything.”
But has storm chasing ever landed him in danger?
“I had to be hospitalised once,” he admits. The incident occurred a year after his celebrated Hilton tower shot in 2001. Rene thought he’d try his luck again the following summer, but mother nature wasn’t going to let him get away with it this time. “I was standing next to the sea in the rain with a metal umbrella and a metal tripod like a crazy man at four in the morning, and this lightning bolt decided to come down about five metres away from me in the sea. The blast of it just threw me back; I lost my camera, and I had blood coming out of my ears for a few days…”
But to Rene, that is a small price to pay in the name of adventure. And his thrill of the chase goes even further than storms. Having taken shots of such high profile celebrities as Brad Pitt, Eric Bana, Orlando Bloom, Sean Connnery, Stephen Spielberg and David Beckham, Rene reckons it’s “cool” to be compared to a Maltese version of the paparazzi. As with storms, he loves the challenge of chasing a celebrity for a photograph.
During Brad Pitt’s visit to Malta, Rene spent three days living in a tree opposite the Hollywood superstar’s bedroom window, backed up by a team providing him with food, water and security. “All part of the fun,” as Rene describes it.
But how does Rene manage to bypass tight foreign security staff when pursuing a celebrity? “I just say to them, ‘You’re either going to let me in, take three shots and I swear to God I’ll just go home, you won’t see me again. Or else, I’m going to hang by all day and make your life hell.’ Usually, it doesn’t work!” he laughs.
But there was one feisty celebrity who proved an extraordinary challenge for Rene.
“When Madonna was on Comino, she had bought out the whole island for the filming. Nobody gets in, nobody gets out. They had police patrols going around continuously. So I went there on a jet ski at night, parked it in a cave; I had a waterproof bag on my back, and I swam alongside the cliffs for about a kilometre and a half in pitch black. Not a nice thing to do. I’m scared of the black sea.”
But even fear doesn’t get in the way of a man who is hell-bent on getting what he wants, and Rene is no exception. “They were filming in the morning, and I just emerged from underwater… I had swum under the boats and actually got into the Blue Lagoon where they were filming, so I got shots of Madonna just a few metres away from her.”
He wasn’t met with a very warm welcome. Far from it. Security caught up with him before hitting him and throwing him off the island, with his jet ski still in the cave.
But Rene’s determination conquered even Madonna’s henchmen. He spotted a Maltese fisherman and asked him to take him back to the island, as close as he could. He then swum the last kilometre back to the island. “Within an hour of being kicked off the island, I was back in taking shots again,” he laughs mischievously.
His daring tactic again landed him in trouble. “I had a police dinghy chasing after me in the water… so I swam like a maniac with this massive waterproof bag across my back … when I managed to get on shore, I uprooted a bush from the ground and I was walking with this bloody bush!”
Rene managed to get back to his jet ski, but wasn’t satisfied with ending his adventure there. He went back to the Blue Lagoon on his jet ski for a final showdown. “I just waved to all the security guards, and then I shot off,” he grins.
When Rene returned to Malta, he slept on the rocks for four hours and waited for Madonna’s boat to arrive, for another photo opportunity. This time, he copped an earful from the Queen of Pop herself. But in the end, Rene managed to get the coveted shot of Madonna and her family. “No one had ever got a shot of Madonna with Guy Ritchie, the kids and their nanny together. It was the first shot ever,” he says.
But despite his mischievous ways, Rene points out that he is not intrusive. “I just want to get the shots. Once I get the shots, you won’t see me again.”
So then, what on earth possessed a photographer to enter the realm of politics?
Rene explains that he grew up in a political family. He often participated in heated family political arguments. And five years working full-time with The Malta Independent reinforced his political interest.
“After five years with the newspaper, I really got used to the political system in the country and how it works. I used to always love it and I started to love it even more. It became a part of me. I always said I’d love to enter politics, but can I?”
Rene wasn’t very convinced at first. After all, how can someone with the background and qualifications of a photographer become a politician?
But all that changed two years ago, when Rene was first approached by Alternattiva Demokratika (AD). After several attempts by AD to get Rene on board, he was convinced to go for it, regardless of the consequences.
“I ended up doing it, still not knowing whether it was a good thing to do or not. But so far, I’ve had very good feedback.”
Rene was born, raised and still resides in Swieqi. He has seen Swieqi develop from an area made up predominantly of fields, to the heavily built-up area it is today. He also had a photo studio there, so he knows most of the residents. As such, AD considered him an ideal candidate to contest in the recent Sweiqi local council election.
“They (AD) said that you are an ideal candidate to go out for Swieqi because you have a background with a newspaper, so you know everyone and how the system works, and you’re good for us because you know Swieqi… I didn’t expect to be elected. I’m very happy about it.”
So now that he has been elected as councillor of Swieqi local council, how does he plan to make a contribution in his new role?
“Having lived in the area for so long, I know what the place needs, and as a young person myself I know what today’s kids need. So, maybe I can improve some things for the kids, and, obviously, I also want to improve the environment in our locality.”
But how will his political career influence his photographic career? “They’re two totally different things,” he firmly points out. “I have my photography part of life, and now there’s a political part of my life.”
And it is perfectly clear which of his careers comes out on top.
“My career is photography. It will always be photography. I will die a photographer, I’m not going to die a politician. Even if I never make a single cent out it, photography is my life.”
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