Has Christoph Wiesner, head of the Rencontres d’Arles since last year, really retired from contemporary art? The photographer presents his program for the 53rd edition of the festival.
Before studying art history at the École du Louvre, Christophe Wiesner dreamed of being a photographer under the tutelage of two uncles, making many films in his small laboratory. Today, several decades later, he details his programming of 53e edition of the festival, placed under the sign of revelations.
Miss Figaro. – In this edition, women are in the center of attention…
Christopher Wiesner. – There is a part that I called Perform and in which we present the Vienna-based Verbund collection, which has never been shown in France. The director focused on these female artists who used photography to defend their role in society, their relationship with sexuality. The exhibition is called Feminist vanguard. Photography is a medium of expression that allows them to go beyond the great techniques of painting, sculpture, and find another language. We find famous names such as Orlan, Cindy Sherman or Helena Almeida, who has a performance dimension in her work.
In the video: Paris Photo intern
So is the performance very present?
This is one of the things that interests me, from speech to dance. We find this in Babette Mangolt’s exhibition, Capturing movements in space, a figure known in France by a small group of aficionados close to the American scene: Bob Wilson, Lucinda Childs, Philip Glass, and who participates in this reflection; “How do you document a body in motion?”
We find this core in Noémie Goodall, who performs in Avignon with Mael Poesy…
He also shows off phoenix In Arles. His theme is related to the history of the planet, the Anthropocene. He recreates landscapes that don’t exist, a forest emerging from water. In this interest in nature there are approaches related to ethnology, anthropology.
Playing Visit againI wanted a strong female figure
Christoph Wiesner
Playing visit again You keep re-reading the story
I wanted to have a strong female body. Lee Miller is iconic. Apart from Man Ray as his muse and his connections to Surrealism, we were interested in his career from 1932 to 1945 as a fashion, studio and then war photographer.
This edition pays tribute to Olivier Etcheverry, the historic stage designer of Arles…
It is dedicated to him. He revolutionized the way photography was presented, bringing to it the concept of architecture and the idea of coloring walls. He created a dynamic for storytelling.
What creative tools do you have?
In France there is a Prix Découverte Louis Roederer. And this year, for the first time in India, the winner of the scholarship created within the framework of the Serendipity festival held in Goa is displayed in the Saint-Trophime monastery. This allows me to draw a line with the poster of the festival, a photograph of Mitch Epstein whose exhibition In India 1978-1989 can be found at Montmajour Abbey. He worked as a cinematographer on the films of director Mira Nair Hello Bombay!
It’s very cinematic…
It sheds light on this collaboration with India and bridges the gap between photography and the moving image, photography and cinema. I want to explore this next year and create surprises.
Arles 2022: The Encounters of Photography, July 4 to September 25. matches-arles.com
Source: Le Figaro
