Since its creation, the Rencontres d'Arles has promoted photography and all its stakeholders, from photographers to artists, curators and publishers. With this in mind, the Rencontres d’Arles associates the Discovery Award Louis Roederer Foundation with all exhibition spaces: through their trailblazing work, galleries, art centers, non-profits, independent venues and institutions are often the first to support emerging artists. During opening week, a jury will bestow the Discovery Award Louis Roederer Foundation, which comes with an acquisition worth €15,000, upon an artist and the project’s supporting organization, and the public will vote for the Public Award, which carries with it an acquisition worth €5,000.

ON THE LOOK-OUT

The exhibition stems from a diffuse but palpable sense of unease shared by the seven artists showcased in the Discovery Award. It evokes a heightened awareness of the world, a physical and psychological state where the artist remains attentive to the troubles of our time without indulging in frontality. Faced with impending or ongoing disasters, alternative scenarios keep catastrophe at bay and outline new paths.

 The term disquiet, popularized by the translation of Portuguesepoet Fernando Pessoa’s work*, describes the heightened, vibratory state of consciousness, perhaps more so than its many imperfect synonyms (malaise, anguish, anxiety…). Nanténé Traoré’s series L’Inquiétude sets the tone. There is a sense of floating, as if everything was about to collapse. Tension is latent but palpable. In her portraits, where cracks and tears abound, Tshepiso Mazibuko examines her generation—the born frees—and the ones that came after in post-apartheid South Africa. Coline Jourdan’s work focuses on making invisible pollution visible. Her photographic approach seeks to detect its traces in the landscape rather than venturing into catastrophism. When François Bellabas photographs California in the grip of wildfires, he offers a dystopian reinterpretation in which AI as gradually taken over. Flashback: for Cemil Batur Gökçeer, the catastrophe has already happened when he creates a sensory archive of disaster (floods, forest fires, earthquakes). The film is then subjected to multiple exposures. The resulting photographs are like omens, conjuring up a sense of doubt. Fast forward: in her installation, Marilou Poncin draws on speculative design to anticipate a near-future where humans can form emotional and sensory relationships with technological objects. More reflexively, in Matan Mittwoch’s photographic installation, a form of muted violence resurfaces when an act of obstruction reveals an incandescent breach, or when an abrasive surface creates the illusion of a stellar landscape. The works presented here often disrupt chronological time and keep us on the lookout.

Audrey Illouz

* Fernando Pessoa, The Book of Disquiet, Pantheon Books, 1991.


Les projets d’artistes sélectionnés pour le Prix Découverte 2023 Fondation Louis Roederer sont :

→ FRANÇOIS BELLABAS (France) 
presented by the CENTRE PHOTOGRAPHIQUE D'ÎLE-DE-FRANCE (France)

→ CEMIL BATUR GÖKÇEER (Turkey)
presented by KA (Turkey)

→ COLINE JOURDAN (France)
presented by LE LIEU DE LA PHOTOGRAPHIE (France)

→ TSHEPISO MAZIBUKO (South Africa)
presented by UMHLABATHI COLLECTIVE (South Africa)

→ MATAN MITTWOCH (Israel)
presented by PAR GALERIE DVIR (Belgium / France / Israel)

→ MARILOU PONCIN (France)
presented by GALERIE LAURENT GODIN (France) 

→ NANTÉNÉ TRAORÉ (France)
presented by GALERIE SULTANA (France)