Cultural report
Photography: the feminist avant-garde of the 1970s at the Rencontres d'Arles
Audio 02:21
The photo “Orlan gives birth to her loves me”, exhibited at the Rencontres de la Photographie in Arles (53rd edition).
© Edmond Sadaka / RFI
By: Edmond Sadaka
3 mins
Direction Arles, in the south of France, where the International Meetings of Photography continue until September 25.
Spotlight on a collective exhibition which presents the projects of 71 major figures of the feminist avant-garde of the 1970s.
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200 works line the route of this exhibition.
Each image, each video seems to denounce the injustices of a resolutely patriarchal society.
The works are signed by artists from Europe, North America and Latin America mainly.
Christoph Wiesner is the director of the Rencontres d'Arles:
“
They were on different continents, but in the end they used the same language and the same vocabulary, had common practices even though they did not know each other.
What is very interesting is to see how photography has also served as a means of emancipation.
»
Entrance to the exhibition “A feminist avant-garde” at the Rencontres de la Photographie in Arles (53rd edition).
© Edmond Sadaka / RFI
All these photos come from
the Viennese Verbund collection
, formed in the 1970s. They show the work of avant-garde photographers and visual artists, including the French Orlan.
“
The Verbund Foundation
has
a huge collection that is uniquely based on the 1970s and the feminist revolution.
So they bought a lot of works from him, and those
works
are touring all over the world.
From the start, the foundation has tried to shed light on all these women who, most of the time, died without any visibility,
”
continues the director of Les Rencontres.
► To listen: Arles Photography Meetings: "A world to heal", 160 years of Red Cross photographs
Most of the exhibition is made up of black and white photos.
The work of the American Francesca Woodman occupies a central place in this vast panorama.
The photographer, who died tragically in 1981 at the age of 22, depicts her rage in the face of the aesthetic standards of the time.
Among the other strong images, the self-portraits of the Cuban Ana Mendieta, who photographs her face glued to a window distorting her features.
The exhibition ends with a self-portrait of Orlan.
The French artist creates a second female body from her own body.
Explanations by Christophe Wiesner: “
This photo is called “Orlan gives birth to her-M’AIME”.
It's not a woman's body, it's rather a body like a work of art, like a mutant body.
The idea was really to give birth to art.
We don't know what body it is
.
»
Visual artist Orlan in front of her own photograph “Orlan gives birth to her loves me” (1964) at the Rencontres de la Photographie in Arles.
© Edmond Sadaka / RFI
The exhibition is organized into several chapters such as “
Housewives – mother – wife
”, or “
Containment – emancipation
”, or even “
Diktat of beauty – female body
”.
It is presented in a place called
La Mécanique générale
, on the site of the former SNCF workshops.
Perhaps a way of reminding us that the work on gender equality is far from over.
►
To read also:
Culture: 53rd Arles Photography Meetings, a very feminist vintage
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