Myop Photographers Discover Our Attainable Worlds — Blind Journal

“It is a retrospective exhibition: it speaks about a collective of 20 photographers and their work over the past 20 years. But it is also prospective, because it raises a question: what will the world look like, starting tomorrow?” With these phrases, Michel Slomka, scenographer of “Unmaking Remaking Dreaming” (Défaire Refaire Rêver, in French) and a member of the Myop company, welcomes the general public to the Carré de Baudouin. And whereas our period is unsettled—marked by bioclimatic, social, and political crises—whereas tensions rise and threaten worldwide agreements, whereas artists know not more than the remainder of us what lies forward, “as a collective, we reflect together on these thorny questions and consider what is possible,” Michel Slomka continues.

Following “My Eyes. Patient Objects” (Mes Yeux, Objets Patients), an exhibition-screening unveiled on the Rencontres d’Arles in the summertime of 2025, the set up at present offered within the pavilion of Paris’s twentieth arrondissement approaches Myop’s archives with renewed power. “We work with a state of the world, and documentary photography can sometimes be depressing. Lucidity is important, but it must not lead to discouragement. We want to summon enthusiasm, the desire to believe that together, we can overcome obstacles,” explains the scenographer. Across the 2 flooring of the Carré de Baudouin, the prints type lengthy friezes, crossing codecs and themes. Neither mounted nor framed, they’re unfold immediately on the partitions in an assemblage that, for Myop, is synonymous with freedom.

At the identical time, and to deepen immersion inside 20 years of archives, 20 totems are scattered all through the area, topped with books—every dedicated to one in all Myop’s photographers. A approach of (re)discovering a particular venture, or of wandering by means of every particular person universe. So many instruments pointing towards a approach ahead: in a world the place tensions translate into regressive insurance policies, the place crises emerge and intertwine, we should act collectively, assume collectively, and rebuild by means of collectivity.

A political response to the long run

From one flooring to the subsequent, it’s by means of sheer quantity that Myop’s photographers handle to grab our consideration. On the partitions, topics multiply, their plurality imposing a pause on the gaze—a pause that forestalls passivity. First come the makeshift dwellings—tents and cabins—spreading throughout the bottom flooring, a reminder of migratory tensions. An opening selection that’s removed from incidental for Michel Slomka: “This fragile habitat is made from the debris the world leaves us. These architectural forms, whether imposed or chosen, push us to invent new models. It is a political response to the future,” he states.

In the third and remaining room, portraits welcome us—and look again at us. Everywhere, ladies’s faces, close-ups, eyes mounted on the digicam. Their gaze follows us to the nook of a wall, the place {a photograph} by Alain Keller depicting a banner bearing the phrase “Libertad” underscores the collective’s dedication. Then faces give option to embraces, to our bodies connecting, entwining in a loving impulse or an instinctive act of assist. Emotion is palpable; humanity is photographed in all its vulnerability. Suddenly, context loses its significance. What issues is the second, the power of union, the visceral want for contact. Captions, furthermore, are absent from the partitions, as if to depart guests the area to reconstruct a story of their very own.

Opposite, curiously, horses and canines fill the prints, a form of nod to these “cute” pictures we can’t assist however take. “Animals have become the domain of the childlike. Yet dogs work, and horses do too. Horses were also among the first motifs represented on cave walls,” notes the scenographer, subtly pointing to the contradictions between affection and the way in which we deal with the environment. “Today, they question us: if you share this bond with us, why not extend it to the rest of the living world?” he continues. With “Unmaking Remaking Dreaming”, Myop thus indicators a retrospective formed as a request: allow us to bear in mind our human situation and, collectively, rise once more.

The exhibition “Défaire Refaire Rêver” is on view at Carré de Baudouin in Paris till March 16, 2026.