Born in France in 1974, Jean-Gabriel Périot never went to film school but studied media and communication. While working in the audiovisual service at Centre Georges Pompidou, he turned to editing and got introduced to archives. This new medium turned out to be for him a never-ending material allowing for the elaboration of new visual narratives. His approach to editing mainly questions violence and history from film and photographic archives.

He directed many short films bordering on documentary, fiction and experimental cinema, as well as longer formats.