Rencontres d'Arles


The Rencontres d’Arles is an annual summer photography festival founded in 1970 by the Arles photographer Lucien Clergue, the writer Michel Tournier and the historian Jean-Maurice Rouquette.
The Rencontres d’Arles has an international impact by showing material that has never been seen by the public before. In 2015, the festival welcomed 93,000 visitors.
The specially designed exhibitions, often organised in collaboration with French and foreign museums and institutions, take place in various historic sites. Some venues, such as 12th-century chapels or 19th-century industrial buildings, are open to the public throughout the festival.
The Rencontres d’Arles has revealed many photographers, confirming its significance as a springboard for photography and contemporary creativity.
In recent years the Rencontres d’Arles has invited many guest curators and entrusted some of its programming to such figures as Martin Parr in 2004, Raymond Depardon in 2006 and the Arles-born fashion designer Christian Lacroix.

Art directors

Events

Opening week at the Rencontres d’Arles features photography-focused events in the town's historic venues, some of which are only open to the public during the festival.
Memorable events in recent years include Europe Night, an overview of European photography; Christian Lacroix's fashion show for the festival's closing ; and Patti Smith's concert for the Vu agency's 20th anniversary.

Nights at the Roman Theatre

At night, work by a photographer or a photography expert is projected in the town's open-air Roman theatre accompanied by concerts and performances. Each event is a one-off creation.
In 2009, 8,500 people attended evenings at the Roman theatre, an average of 2,000 a night, and 2,500 were there on closing night, when the Tiger Lilies played during a projection of Nan Goldin's “The Ballad of Sexual Dependency”.
In 2013 over 6,000 people attended the nighttime photography projections, an average of approximately 1,000 each night.

The Night of the Year

The Night of the Year, which was created in 2006, allows visitors to walk around and see the festival's favourite works by artists and photographers as well as carte blanche exhibitions by institutions.

Cosmos-Arles Books

Cosmos-Arles Books is a Rencontres d’Arles satellite event dedicated to new publishing practices.
Over the past 15 years large-scale photographic publications, self-published books, and ebooks have become essential media for experimentation by photographers and artists. They allow photography to be rediscovered as a means of expression and distribution, providing a rich terrain of expression for the art's fundamentally hybrid forms.

Symposia and panel discussions

Photographers and professionals participating in symposia and panel discussions during opening week discuss their work or issues raised by the images on display.
In recent years the themes included whether a black-and-white aesthetic is still conceivable in photography ; the impact of social networks on creativity and information ; breaking with past, a key idea for photography today ; photography commissions: freedom or constraint ; challenges and changes in the photography market.

The Rencontres d’Arles awards

Since 2002 the Rencontres d’Arles awards have been an opportunity to discover new talents. In 2007 the number of annual awards was reduced to three, presented at the closing ceremony of the festival's professional week: the Discovery Award, Author's Book Award and History Book Award.

Luma Rencontres Dummy Book Award

In 2015 the Rencontres d’Arles offered an award to assist with the publication of a dummy book. Endowed with a €25,000 budget production budget, this new prize is open to all photographers and artists using photography who submit a dummy book that has never been published.
The winner's book will be produced in autumn 2015 and be presented at the 2016 Rencontres d’Arles.

Photo Folio Review & Gallery

Since 2006 aspiring photographers have been able to submit their portfolios to international photography experts in various fields, including publishers, exhibition curators, heads of institutions, agency directors, gallery owners, collectors, critics and photo editors, for appraisal during the festival's opening week. Photo Folio Review & Gallery offers them an opportunity to show their work throughout the festival.

Photography classes

The Rencontres d’Arles has always been a place where professional photographers and practitioners on every level have been able to meet each other and exchange ideas. Each year, photography class participants undertake a personal journey of creation through photography's aesthetic, ethical and technological issues.
Leading photographers such as Guy le Querrec, Antoine d’Agata, Martin Parr, René Burri and Joan Fontcuberta regularly teach at the Rencontres d’Arles.

Rentrée en Images

“Rentrée en Images” has been a key part of the festival's educational activities since 2004. During the first two weeks in September, special mediators take students from the primary to graduate school level on guided tours of the exhibitions. Based on the festival's programming, the event aims to introduce young people to the visual arts and fits in with a wider policy of cultural democratisation. “Rentrée en Images” reaches thousands of students, and for many of them it is their first exposure to contemporary art.

Budget

Public funding accounted for 40% of the 2015 festival's €6.3-million budget, sales, 40% and private partnerships, 20%.

Executive Committee

2002