Rouvrir le monde with Clémence Elman and Léonard Contramestre

Clémence Elman, born in 1992, lives and works in Arles. After obtaining a degree in Political Science from IEP in Toulouse, she attended the École Nationale Supérieure de la Photographie (ENSP) in Arles, graduating in 2020. In 2022, she exhibited at 100% L’EXPO – Sorties d’Écoles at La Villette, and in the same year, completed a residency as part of the Rencontres de la jeune photographie internationale at the Villa Pérochon in Niort. She also received the Prix Sud Emergence for the short film ‘Tornerò’, which she co-directed, and the Eurazeo 2022 grant.

Léonard Contramestre, born in 1996, lives and works in Arles. After earning a DNA at the École Supérieure d’Arts d’Annecy (ESAAA), where he developed a practice primarily focused on photography, video and installation, he graduated from ENSP in 2022. The same year, he co-directed the film ‘Tornerò’, which was first screened at the Rencontres de la Photographie d’Arles, then at the OVNI festival in Nice, where it won the Prix Sud Émergence 2022. Following this, he was invited for a residency in Nice in March 2023.

Host structure: Grasse Detention Center
The project: the relationship between fiction and reality, the enclosed space and the construction of an ‘other’ space, the absurd: using photography and video, alongside the intervening artists, inmates at the Grasse Detention Center, step into the shoes of fictional characters. The premise: a waiting room. What happens there? From the script to the shoot, including the storyboard and character development, participants and artists collectively create each stage of a fictional story.

Rouvrir le monde – Un été culturel, a DRAC PACA initiative.