Charlotte Perriand - How do we want to live? Politics of photomontage.

Charlotte Perriand dedicated her life to better the living conditions of the greatest number of people, creating an « art of inhabiting » in connection with nature. She used photography not only as a tool to observe reality, but also to defend her conception of a new world. Echoing our current concerns, in the 1930s she uses large-scale photomontages to denunciate unhealthy urbanism and provide her own vision on how to improve life. Her photographic frescoes demonstrate the modernity of her approach, such as La Grande Misère de Paris (1936), the waiting room of the Minister of Agriculture (1937), or the pavilion of the Ministry of Agriculture at the Exposition internationale des arts et techniques de la vie moderne (International Exposition of Art and Technology in Modern Life) of 1937, composed with Fernand Léger. The exhibition offers a dive into her perception of the world through her method of creation and her incredible collection of photographs – period prints, negatives, magazine cut-outs, personal photographs -, archives placed against reconstitutions of her monumental photomontages. Exhibition produced by the Rencontres d'Arles for the 52nd edition. Exhibition’s Curator: Damarice Amao, with the complicity of Sébastien Gokalp and the Charlotte Perriand Archives. Based on an original scenography by Olivier Etcheverry, assisted by Amanda Antunes