Repeating Islands

A beautiful, moving retrospective by Denise Colomb is on view at the Jeu de Paume (l’Hôtel de Sully, 62, rue Saint-Antoine) in Paris. Denise Colomb aux Antilles: De la légende à la réalité, 1948-1958 opened on September 29 and will close on December 27, 2009.

Denise Colomb undertook two trips as a reporter to Martinique, Guadeloupe, and Haiti in 1948 and 1958. The first voyage was initiated by Aimé Césaire, who invited her to join the centennial celebration of the abolition of slavery in the French Antilles (1848-1948). She returned 10 years later on a job for the Compagnie générale transatlantique (the French luxury ocean liner company). Apart from her important archival work on painters, these two reportages, which deal with Caribbean daily life and customs, constitute the most significant work in Colomb’s collection in terms of quality and quantity (9,100 images). These two years, 1948 and 1958, also mark Colomb’s most noteworthy period of activity, when she produced the work that best illustrates her humanistic vision. (In these years we also see her shift from black and white to color photos.)

In 1999, Denise Colomb and Noël Bourcier, the exhibition’s curator, began a selection of her photographs, travel writing (ethnographic notes and reflections) as well as press releases (for example, an article cosigned Colomb and Césaire, published in Regards). Unfortunately, Colomb was never able to see the finished collection; she passed away on January 1, 2004, at the age of 101.

For more information, see http://www.jeudepaume.org/

You may also access a guided tour of Denise Colomb’s photographic archives at www.mediatheque-patrimoine.culture.gouv.fr

Photo featured here is Récréation (1948).