EDITO • JACQUES ROCHER
UNVEILING THE WORLD
As uncertainty surrounds the future of Europe, hopes for a peaceful and harmonious tomorrow have never been stronger. These past few years have certainly been disruptive, transforming all our lives. Culture, and in particular photography, enables us to find the keys we need to move forward together as citizens of the world.
Since 2004, La Gacilly Photo Festival has contributed to the vitality and revival of a rural area. With its roots firmly established in the village, close to local people and institutions, every summer the Festival Association stages an event showcasing multifaceted photography that is acclaimed both nationally and internationally.
With the help of a team of enthusiasts and an invaluable crew of volunteers, backed by public and private partners who remain as committed and passionate as ever, the Festival is an inclusive event that unites photographers, other operators and the public around a set of shared values.
EDITO • AUGUSTE COUDRAY
AWARE, RESPONSIBLE AND CONFIDENT
We have recently reached new thresholds of horror, revolt, anger and incomprehension. Our perspective of the whole world is being readjusted. We are being engulfed by a profusion of reports and messages, each more distressing than the last. Among all this confusion and conflicting information – sometimes disinformation, or incomplete information that is intended to further our understanding – what are we supposed to think and do?
This atmosphere weighs heavily on each and every one of us as we go about our daily lives. However, we mustn’t stop living for fear of suffering. Let’s continue to believe in the creative capacity and resistance to oppression of a nation that will sooner or later secure its own freedom. In parallel, we should be proud of the tremendous solidarity that we continue to show daily to this beleaguered population to ensure they will stand up again tomorrow.
EDITO • STÉPHANIE RETIÈRE-SECRET
OUR OTHERNESS
As we approach a new landmark anniversary, it is not unusual to feel a certain sense of excitement, impatience even, as we eagerly look ahead to what comes next. What is important, however, is to take our time and to savour each and every year. This is how La Gacilly Photo Festival has grown, taking its time and acting with sincerity. It is now officially entering its 19th year, ready to unveil new talents and new perspectives. New visions from artists, who are witnesses of history and culture – prophets (if there is such a thing) of a future, be it devastating or full of promise.
These photographers remind us how the Festival’s fundamental aims – to Inspire, Inform and Engage – are more relevant than ever. For it is all about living in an enlightened way and about being well informed. Our exhibitions also abound in emotions and sensitivity due to the extraordinary creativity that is implemented and displayed here.
EDITO • CYRIL DROUHET
IMAGES OF HOPE
“It’s pointless Man conquering the moon if he ends up losing the earth.” François Mauriac
We often say that history repeats itself as a way of burying our heads in the sand or reassuring ourselves. History, with its bloody excesses and obscurantist tendencies, must not be repeated, or it would amount to a sad admission of man’s worthlessness. When chaos reminds us, as it does all too often these days, of our worst memories, we focus on our immediate worries and put the more distant, less perceptible reality off until tomorrow. This is a very natural, human feeling, and no one should be blamed for it. And yet... The same is true of the fragile balance of our planet: we are aware of it, we can feel it, we know that the living world is dying, that we are subsisting in a precarious environmental state, but the troubles and dangers that make today’s headlines obscure this inevitable fate.
Since its creation, La Gacilly Photo Festival has never strayed from its original aim: to show, without naivety and through the prism of photography, the beauty of nature and the need to protect it, the solutions available for leaving our children a healthier planet, and the challenges of a sustainable world. Without ever taking our eyes off the often dramatic reality. Playwright Octave Feuillet was not mistaken when he wrote: “Hope is like the night sky – there is no corner so dark that the persistent eye does not end up finding a star.”