Audrey Hoareau
Interview
Can you introduce yourself and explain your interest in photography ?
I started my career at the Musée Nicéphore Niépce, one of the most prestigious institutions dedicated to photography and home to an exceptional public collection. I learned a lot during thirteen years working on the collection. Then I became independent and was able to define my own line of work by curating exhibitions and providing artistic direction. Today, since recently at the head of the CRP/ Centre régional de la photographie Hauts de France, I work on the exhibition program and have an incredible collection to develop. Photography has naturally become a specialty. It is a fascinating medium that opens the field of possibilities to infinity.1.
How did you come to be the director of the CRP?
I was waiting for an opportunity of this type, a place with so much promise, a tool on a human scale to develop beyond the territory. I applied with the ambition to take on the challenge that this represents. It is a historic institution that will celebrate its 40th anniversary next year, a center of contemporary art of national interest labeled by the Ministry of Culture in 2019. There is much to do and a team that is not afraid to roll up its sleeves. I am happy to find a collective dynamic.
René Maltête is an atypical street photographer, and very much oriented towards humor and nonsense. How was this superb book born?
I was contacted by the Chêne publishing house with the desire to publish a large-scale monograph. I was very enthusiastic about the idea of working on this beautiful archive and on the photographic writing of RENE MALTETE on his singularity and humor. He is still too little known to the public, yet he has produced a lot. He leaves us a visually strong and important work to understand the France of the last century. His ambivalence, between tradition and progress, the 1960's which covers the majority of the book was a pivotal decade, the one of all mutations. Beyond the historical value of this testimony, I discovered a photographer who was passionate about Tati's cinema and Prévert's words, who sought more than anything else to make people smile, to reveal the poetry in each moment.
How did you go about collecting the archives and choosing the images?
Physically, the archive is preserved by the rightful owners, and his two sons had a look and a necessary contribution in the construction of the work. GAMMA RAPHO also contributed a lot to its realization. R. Maltête has remained faithful to this mythical agency all his life and the links are still very strong with the family. The publisher gave the book an artistic direction, with a lot of commitment and ambition. For my part, I could clearly see the scenario of the book taking shape around the author's relationship with time. René Maltête is a man of his time, a man of the moment, but he constantly oscillates between nostalgia and projections.
Are you planning a future exhibition of René Maltête's work?
It would be a logical continuation for the valorization of the work! Allowing the public to confront the period prints and to discover the story we tell in this book in the form of an exhibition would obviously be a great project.