Its a very beautiful day #5 (2025), Pierre & Florent, photography
Arles, a city steeped in history and culture, has once again demonstrated its power as a beacon of inspiration for art lovers. For the Rencontres d'Arles , ArtMajeur by YourArt has curated an exceptional tour of six Arles galleries, led by curator Marc Donnadieu .
This curated tour aimed to highlight the work of gallery owners and artists, while offering visitors a sensory and intellectual immersion into the richness of the local artistic scene.
Here is an overview of this day punctuated by walking, discussions and discovery .
Galerie Laurent Godin: A new wave in Arles
Our first stop took us to the Galerie Laurent Godin , a newcomer to the Arles landscape. After many years in Paris, this international gallery chose Arles to inaugurate a new space, marking a strategic turning point.
From the entrance, the tone is set: the gallery is offering a group show focused on sculpture and drawing , where several artists engage in dialogue around questions of image and identity. Among them, Wang Du , whose works question our relationship to the media and social networks, or Alain Veigner and Gérard Traquandi , whose pieces evoke memory, archives and transmission.
A strong introduction, which reveals the commitment of the program from the very first steps.
Porte B. (La Cour Cachée) Gallery: Between Mysticism and Memory
Leaving the white walls of the Galerie Godin, we wander through the alleys of Arles to reach the Cour Cachée , a more intimate, almost secret space.
It is in this discreet place that a temporary exhibition of the Porte B gallery has taken place for the summer.
Based in the 10th arrondissement of Paris, Porte B. — a young gallery founded in 2022 — stands out for its sensitive and collaborative approach, which it deploys here outside its walls, in Arles.
The first exhibition, "The Miracle of the Sun," by Marguerite Bornhauser and Marion Flament , explores mystical representations through light, color, and material. Thermoformed glass, ceramics, and photography create an experience inspired by the miracle of Fátima.
The second exhibition, "Hiroshima, Suspended Memory" , by the artist duo Pierre and Florent, immerses us in a more introspective register, with documentary work around the traumatic memory of the places.
Two powerful propositions that invite us to contemplate the visible and the invisible differently .
Régala Gallery: The Earth in Motion
We continue our journey to the Régala Gallery , which welcomes us into a space where the energy of the earth seems to express itself at every corner of the wall.
The artist Jean-Pierre Formica presents a body of work combining ceramics , watercolors and volumes. Here, the material lives, flows, freezes, and then transforms.
Originally from the South, Formica infuses his works with a poetic gesture , between telluric forces and Mediterranean memory.
As Marc Donnadieu says, "you feel like you're entering a studio" as this gallery seems to be a living place, in perpetual transformation.
Anne Clergue Gallery: Stromboli, the island and the fire
After a short break, we head to the Galerie Anne Clergue , on the edge of the old town. This gallery, founded in 2014 by the daughter of photographer Lucien Clergue , co-founder of the Rencontres, remains faithful to the city's photographic heritage.
This year it presents the work of Chiara Indelicato , a series born during confinement, dedicated to the volcanic island of Stromboli .
Developed in sea water or in coffee , printed on seaweed paper , his photographs interact with natural elements in a quest for a link between image and material .
The volcano, still active, becomes a metaphor for the vital force , for the fragile balance between nature and humanity.
Gallery eight: Alice Springs & crossed perspectives
We head back north to discover Galerie huit , housed in an elegant mansion. This summer, two exhibitions are co-existing there, weaving links between the history of portraiture and contemporary creation .
The first is dedicated to Alice Springs , alias June Newton , a major figure in portrait photography. It features a gallery of celebrities, captured with precision and sensitivity: from Yves Saint Laurent to François Mitterrand , including Jean-Paul Gaultier .
At the same time, the exhibition "Tradition and Evolution" , in collaboration with the British Journal of Photography , examines the changes in visual heritage and identities through a diversity of international perspectives.
A game of temporal mirrors between icons of yesterday and narratives of today.
Echo Gallery 119: Sacred Lights
To conclude this tour, we join the Galerie Écho 119 , housed in an old Romanesque chapel . The place, bathed in soothing natural light, offers a perfect setting for the "Sacred Lights" exhibition.
Two artists respond to each other in a silent but vibrant dialogue. Japanese artist Rinko Kawauchi , with her delicate compositions, speaks to us of rebirth and peace through flowers enhanced with watercolor. Belgian artist Laure Winants , for her part, captures the luminous layers of the Arctic , revealing the memory inscribed in the ice.
A spiritual and luminous conclusion to this day intense in visual emotions .
This tour curated by ArtMajeur by YourArt , orchestrated by Marc Donnadieu , was much more than a simple series of exhibitions: a traveling immersion in contemporary art , to the rhythm of walking, looking and sharing words.
Each gallery revealed a part of the diversity and vitality of the Arlesian scene , confirming the role of Arles as an essential crossroads of visual creation .
Many thanks to Marc Donnadieu for his expertise and infectious passion, as well as to all the galleries and artists for their warm welcome and inspiring work.
Nicolas Sarazin
