At the Mont d'Arbois, above Megève, 1938 © Willy Ronis

Co-produced by the Jeu de Paume and the Médiathèque de l'Architecture et du Patrimoine, this retrospective exhibition looks back on the photographer's journey, from his beginnings to his international consecration. It highlights the political commitments and stylistic developments of the photographer and unveils, alongside the most iconic shots, photographs of Megève and the Alps still unknown to the public.

"Photography is emotion"

"Photography is emotion": thus expressed Willy Ronis, this great photographer who was in turn reporter, industrial photographer or illustrator, who marked the French photography of the twentieth century alongside Brassaï, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Raymond Depardon, Robert Doisneau, Jacques-Henri Lartigue or Marc Riboud. For nearly eighty years (from the 1930s to the 2000s) Willy Ronis focused his lens on the French, striding with ever-renewed pleasure in the streets of the capital, the industrial territories or the south of France. Photographer of happy chances, Ronis happily mixes the “ordinary slices of life” of the portraits of his wife Marie-Anne or of his son Vincent with the demands of a professional man, who sees his work recognized in 1951 at the time of an exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art (Moma).

A committed man, he illustrates the fights of his time, capturing the strike movements of factories or the return of prisoners of war in 1945. His images of the deprived in society, of the pickets and of union activists are, without miserability, the the fruit of genuine solidarity with the workers' struggle and of an active commitment to those left behind. Polyglot, curious, Willy Ronis opened very early abroad, traveling from the 1930s to Italy, England, the United States, or photographing, in the midst of the Cold War, Moscow, Berlin and Prague. At the end of his career, faithful to his commitments, he decided to donate his work to the State. The photographic prints of this retrospective exhibition are a choice among the 108 negatives, 000 slides, 9 prints, 000 albums of reference prints, the contact sheets, the archives, as well as the photographer's library kept by the Médiathèque de architecture and heritage (MAP). An entire section of the exhibition will be devoted to the Alps and in particular to Megève where Willy Ronis liked to come skiing and where, in the 20s, he carried out two photographic campaigns, one for the ski school of André Ledoux, the other at the request of the Air France review, the other at the request of the Air France review, the other at the request of the Air France review.

Pratical information

Paid access: € 8 adult entry - € 4 reduced price - free for children under 16
Open from 12/12/20 to 31/03/21, every day from 15 p.m. to 19 p.m. except Monday.

To know more : https://lepalaismegeve.com/