« For most of history, man has had to fight nature to survive; in this century he is beginning to realise that, in order to survive, he must protect it. » Charles III

It is 21 September 2023 and, during his state visit to France, the new head of state of the United Kingdom is confidently taking the floor of the Senate to defend the fight of his life, the fight to protect biodiversity, to promote farming that respects our bountiful earth and to combat climate change. For those who aren’t aware, Charles III has always been known for his cutting-edge approach to ecology, and has unhesitatingly published his carbon footprint every year. He instinctively abhors everything that industrial society has engendered: the destruction of nature, anonymous managerialism and growth at all costs. An activist utopian, he advocates for model farms and short supply chains. On his estate at Highgrove House, in Gloucestershire, he lives out these beliefs. Since 1985, he has turned over the 365 hectares of his estate to organic farming, banning GMOs, chemical inputs and synthetic fertilisers. Our blue-blooded protagonist doesn't rail against polluters - he's too polite for that - but he does act to save a part of the planet, his own land, where he has his roots and finds his bearings. This is something that each and every one of us should do to promote a bit of global civic-mindedness.

The climate takes a turn for the worse

Is the King of England an original? He is certainly a contrarian when it comes to the denial that has taken hold of our times. The climate, which was one of our leaders' priorities until recently, has now been relegated to the back burner. It has to be said that an ill wind has swept across our planet, bringing with it a trail of doom and gloom and anxiety-provoking news, which hardly makes us inclined to look to the future with optimism. Ours is an era marked by conflicts in the Middle East and Ukraine, threats to use nuclear weapons, economic tensions, the rise of populism, protectionism, and the arrival of Donald Trump in the White House who, to say the least, is not an apostle of peace and understanding between peoples. Having only just regained power, the 47th President of the United States - a committed climate sceptic - struck fast and hard, freezing environmental subsidies, questioning the reality and seriousness of global warming, redoubling attacks on science and proven facts, prioritising the fossil fuel industry, and ushering us abruptly into a new era of ignorance and uncontrolled artificial intelligence.

Unfortunately, while we wait for pragmatism to return, the natural world is not faring any better and climate change is accelerating. In recent months, mega-fires have once again ravaged Canada, California and parts of Los Angeles, 
unprecedented floods have submerged Valencia in Spain and Freetown in Sierra Leone, and ever more powerful hurricanes have battered the coasts of Florida and Indonesia, Mayotte and Reunion Island, wreaking havoc on ecosystems and leaving populations distraught. The fault, time and time again, lies with extreme temperatures.

2024 was the hottest year on record since 1850, due to the ever-increasing accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere as a result of human activity. And temperatures are now averaging over 15°C at the Earth's surface, 0.7°C higher than in 1990. But should we simply give in to the prevailing pessimism? « Lightness is necessary, otherwise tragedy would be fatal », as the playwright Yasmina Reza likes to say. It's a maxim that we'll be celebrating for the 22nd La Gacilly Photo Festival. We set out our stall for a positive approach to ecology ; we grasped that photography could also be the receptacle for luminous energy ; we gave our Morbihan village a stage by offering it up to photos by exhibited artists, like so many windows open to the world. Continuing to marvel, to be moved, to understand without bias the 21st century’s new environmental challenges, to highlight initiatives that contribute to this battered harmony between people and the Earth are all virtues that promote tolerance and optimism.

An England so... exotic

So it's no coincidence that, in these troubled times, we wanted to welcome to Brittany the offbeat viewpoint of our cousins from the other side of the Channel, who so brilliantly sketch our times, sometimes with humour, often with acerbic wit, and always with a great sense of lucidity. This is a fascinating England. We often look far and wide for the exotic. Yet it may be closer than we think, over the cliffs just north of Dover. Between France and Great Britain, there is a long thousand-year history of misunderstandings and enmities, admiration and respect. Probably because the British don't do anything like other people, and especially not like us: they drive on the left, they have their own currency, they vote for Brexit, they play darts, they believe in ghosts and they still have a monarchy. And that's probably why we love them. They have their own uniqueness, their own creativity and that touch of eccentricity that they foster even in the darkest of situations. Because in the land of sober suits and rigid upbringings, flamboyance is cultivated as an art. 

Ever since Oscar Wilde walked a lobster on a lead along London’s riverbank, we have known that this propensity to defy understanding is nothing new. Winston Churchill knew how to use words and puns to poke fun at his opponents. Monty Python turned zany, provocative humour into a veritable work of art, daring sacrilegiously to cast a mocking eye at the life of Christ and the heroics of the legendary King Arthur. As for Beau Brummell, “the king of fashion”, he spent forty-five minutes knotting his tie. At the end of his life, exiled in Paris and harassed by creditors, he would hold imaginary receptions in his maid's room, announcing the phantom guests himself to the empty room. The Beatles, the Rolling Stones and the Sex Pistols have shaken things up, but have always been loyal subjects of His or Her Majesty. English history is full of these personalities who are considered extravagant elsewhere, but who, for a British person, contribute to the identity of a country where the unifying principle of the Crown has always left plenty of room for individuality. After all, irreverence also furthers the ideal of freedom.
 

So British : the 2025 programme

The British photographers we are honouring this summer have this singular style. They're so British because they know how to cleverly capture a soul: the soul of an era, the soul of a country, the human soul. At La Gacilly, we've always wanted to honour the great masters of photography, and Sir Don McCullin, knighted by Queen Elizabeth II, is a legend. Throughout his career, he has placed his lens as close as possible to individuals, to their valour and their fears, their thoughtlessness and beliefs. He didn't photograph the misery of the excluded, he denounced it; he didn't photograph war, he decried its absurdity; he didn't photograph the English countryside or ancient landscapes, he showed their fragility. This retrospective of his work stirs our minds, while leaving intact our capacity to take on a new consciousness.

If mischievousness remains the prerogative of the British, Martin Parr is its photographic standard-bearer. For over fifty years, this indefatigable chronicler of English society has cast an implacable, razor-sharp eye over his compatriots, from both modest and more affluent backgrounds. His work is accentuated by a perfectly mastered art of framing (and close-ups), a liking for bright colours, and a skilful use of flash lighting, thanks to which he has freed himself from all stuffy academicism. Where did he find his inspiration? Martin Parr admits that he feels great admiration for an artist who is sadly forgotten today, a genius of the art of mockery who died too soon at the age of 31 in the early 1970s : Tony Ray-Jones. At La Gacilly, we'll be introducing you to this ironic observer of the mores of his time, who gave humour its rightful place without ever lapsing into needless cruelty.

These two forerunners of unbridled, light-hearted photography have seen their work emulated. Peter Dench likes to examine the contradictions of a society that we believe to be deeply attached to tradition. Crown subjects flock to all the ceremonies laid on for their sovereigns, but find themselves overwhelmed by emotion, in a skilful blend of trashiness and class, absurdity and seriousness, pragmaticism and eccentricity. As for Josh Edgoose, who is very active on social media, he roams the streets of London in search of the unexpected, favouring vibrant colours, incongruous details and moments of joy and spontaneity. Each of his images is the result of a happy coincidence, and this is the first time his work has been shown in France. « Swinging London » - a permanently effervescent capital - reminds us that a whole genre of untamed pop music was born on the banks of the Thames or in the suburbs of Liverpool and then swept across the world. Terry O'Neill witnessed this sizzling, exhilarating revolution. Crucially, he was the photographic confidant of England's enfants terribles, from the Beatles to the Rolling Stones and David Bowie to Elton John, bringing all the artists involved in this new scene before his lens. His images are now iconic, and take us back to a world not so long past.

But British photography can also be proud of the fact that, from its very beginnings, it has set its sights on the wonders of nature. Did you know that the United Kingdom and France share the privilege of being the inventors of the medium ? Although Nicéphore Niepce, from Chalon-sur-Saône, was the first to set an image on a metal plate, it was an English botanist who was the first to develop this technique all the way back in 1843. Anna Atkins was a pioneer in this field, and at La Gacilly we'll be presenting some of her cyanotypes, used to create herbariums of spellbinding beauty, which are astonishingly modern when you consider that many contemporary artists are once again using this almost 200-year-old process. A new generation is fiercely defending this heritage that pays homage to nature.

Three women will be featured in our programme.  Gina Soden has made abandoned places her kingdom to offer us works of rare poetry, exploring manor houses and old mansions that their owners have left behind, disused factories and dilapidated hospitals where nature reclaims its rights. Cig Harvey experiments with colours, our sensory experiences and bodies that blend into nature so that she can awaken our senses and stir our need for delicacy. Finally, Mary Turner takes a tender look at the marginalised populations of post-industrial England, with an eye reminiscent of Ken Loach's films which places human beings at the heart of all her shots.

2025, the Year of the Sea

Artists shed light on our world and stand witness to a troubled land. 2025 is the Year of the Sea in France, and in June our country will host the major United Nations Ocean Conference. We like to repeat that we are the world's second largest maritime nation, and with this comes responsibilities and duties. Oceans, which cover 70 % of the Earth's surface, are a major regulator of the Earth's climate, absorbing more than 90 % of the excess heat in the climate system caused by massive greenhouse gas emissions. Warmer waters lead to ever more violent hurricanes and storms, as we are seeing today. We must remain vigilant in the face of these alarming facts, and ensure that these maritime areas remain in good health, so that they can continue to perform the balancing acts that allow life on land to thrive. Our Festival will offer its support to this event by showcasing the beauty of the sea and making raising awareness of its challenges central to our programme.  Who better than Laurent Ballesta to give us a vivid insight into the underwater world’s fragile ecosystem ? A multi-talented biologist and photographer, he takes us under the ice of Antarctica, before showing us the ballet of the Polynesian grey sharks and letting us discover the coelacanth, a prehistoric fish that he was the first to immortalise. Then we'll take a refreshing dip with Robert Doisneau, whose work extends far beyond Paris and its suburbs. During advertising commissions and family holidays, Robert Doisneau cast his curious, cheeky and benevolent eye over the French coastline. As for Stéphane Lavoué, a great portraitist who has become a friend of our Festival, this winter he set off to meet the « Sea Workers », or people whose work is linked to the sea. For this commission launched by the Conseil Départemental du Morbihan, vessel traffic controllers, tugboat captains and fishmongers tell us about their passion and the seas that take skill to face down. Indian photographer Supratim Bhattacharjee has worked in the Sunderbans archipelago for many years, and shows us the daily lives of people faced with climate disasters and rising sea levels, phenomena that could soon affect us all if we continue to turn a blind eye to them.

The emotions behind positive ecology

Discovering the world around us so that we can understand it better, with photos that speak to the universal language of emotions, is another mission we have set ourselves. Indefatigable traveller, fashion photographer and member of the Académie des Beaux-Arts Françoise Huguier is honouring us with a stopover in La Gacilly for her landmark book published this summer, « Emotive Africa », a tribute to the land she has loved for nearly 40 years. She explores its soul from Mali to Ethiopia, Benin to Mozambique, with shots tinged with poetry and a no-nonsense style of writing.

We'll be staying in Africa, in Tanzania to be precise, to discover the long-term work by Frédéric Noy. As part of the Yves Rocher Foundation's photographic commissions focussing on nature sanctuaries in need of protection, he took an interest in a little-known park, Udzungwa, where populations of endemic monkeys threatened by urbanisation live in the heart of a primary forest. The wilderness is constantly shrinking and untouched land is gradually being taken over by human activity. In an essay that is as much documentary as it is artistic, Axelle de Russé used infrared technology to view our two inhabited polar worlds, in the North and in the South. We can now see that, faced with global warming, Svalbard and Chilean Patagonia are gradually attracting each other, merging, and suffering from the same ills in the form of rising temperatures and the arrival of mass tourism. We have said it before, but the wilderness is shrinking. A regular contributor to National Geographic, Corey Arnold proves this very point with this astonishing report on the bears, coyotes and raccoons that venture into our cities in search of food they can no longer find in their original habitat. Such images would make you smile if they didn't convey invasive modernity in all its complexity.

To round off this year's event, as an ephemeral gift to nature and an ode to travel and contemplation, we'll be exhibiting the sensory and aesthetic world of François Fontaine, winner of the 2025 Leica Prize for New Environmental Photography. His images, taken when the flowers are in full bloom, are like prints revealing dappled light, magical reflections, the wind in the trees and the blossoming of a new season.

They say joy is contagious. This new edition is a breath of fresh air in a dark age, celebrating life so that we can all love it all the more.

Cyril DROUHET
Exhibition curator at La Gacilly Photo Festival