The Galerie Le Réverbère in Lyon will close at the end of the year. Histoire(s) sans fin will be their last collective exhibition, it will open in September. Catherine Dérioz and Jacques Damez sent us this letter:
45 years of commitment as a couple to photography, 43 years of gallery work including 35 years at 38 rue Burdeau in Lyon: an incredible adventure lived intensely with its ups and downs, its fits of laughter and its anger, its fabulous encounters with artists and collectors who have been at the heart of all our debates and moods!
And then, 20 years after the opening, the arrival of assistants who offered us their energy, their skills and supported this utopia.
Opening, outside Paris, in 1981, as an independent gallery dedicated solely to contemporary photography in all its “ways” and keeping it open for 4 decades was a crazy gamble but a winning one!
Well almost… because over the last ten years the market has changed a lot: it has become codified, “financialized” and is concentrated in the hands of a certain international taste which no longer allows the same freedom of action and choice.
We loved the first 15 years of Paris Photo so much when gallery owners, photographers, journalists and institutions formed a community with the fair team (thanks to Rick Gadella and Valérie Fougeirol) thanks to confident and free exchanges, all focused on a single goal. and the same goal: to share our passion for Photography with pioneering collectors or curious and cultured amateurs.
We were more messy perhaps, but creative, generous and open to sometimes heated debates! Little by little everyone had to choose their “place”. The wooden language had taken hold, the discourses of contemporary art have become impoverished and the cultural whole has gained ground…
Despite our reputation, our curatorial services paid and shared with the artists for exhibitions as well as our intellectual services have diminished and almost disappeared after Covid and force us today to close the gallery and stop its programming at the end of the year 2024.
Too many free services (free entry to exhibitions, travel with little or no reimbursement, loans of works without any remuneration, guided tours or free conferences, design and coordination of the Photography(s) Lyon & co agenda, assistance with artists’ filling forms for residences, calls for tenders, applications for prizes, etc.) consume our team’s time.
As the deputy for culture of the City of Lyon told us 20 years ago: you work like a real public service without being asked and without costing the community a cent!
And nothing has changed!
However, in 2023, we were happy to have regained our pre-2020 turnover regarding the sale of works.
But the costs have increased significantly and the imperialism of the fairs is trapping us.
Sad conclusion: the economic model of a gallery our size, without public or private financial support, is no longer viable.
To end this last year in style in our gallery, after The Dazzlement of Appearances by Yves Rozet, Silence by Julien Magre, we invite you to discover Histoire(s) sans fin with a choice of emblematic, rare, iconic or unique works from each of our photographers.
Endless because our love of Photography remains intact as does our belief in the creative strength of our artists who never cease to question themselves and plow their furrow with intelligence and sensitivity.
Otherwise, we will continue in a different way to imagine exhibitions, to give works to read, to offer beauty and emotions to the public.
As proof, the publication of Jacques Damez’s essay: Denis Roche – L’endroit du temps in 2026 by the editions of La Lettre volsé as well as the release in 2025 by Actes Sud in the Photo Poche collection of Denis Roche prefaced by Jacques Damez.
We hope that there will be many of you at the start of the school year (from September 21 to December 28, 2024) to share this final bouquet with the artists and that it will give you the desire to treat yourself to one or more photographs to enrich your interior garden.
With a smile and a note of humor to welcome you soon…
Bye Buy!
Catherine Dérioz et Jacques Damez
Histoire(s) sans fin
collective exhibition presented from September 21 to December 28, 2024
Frédéric BELLAY, Arièle BONZON, Dirk BRAECKMAN, Pierre CANAGUIER, Thomas CHABLE, Serge CLÉMENT, Beatrix VON CONTA, Jacques DAMEZ, François DELADERRIÈRE, André FORESTIER, Lionel FOURNEAUX, Rip HOPKINS, William KLEIN, Géraldine LAY, Baudoin LOTIN, Julien MAGRE, Jean-Claude PALISSE, Philippe PÉTREMANT, Bernard PLOSSU, Marc RIBOUD, Denis ROCHE, Yves ROZET
Galerie Le Réverbère
38 rue Burdeau
69001 Lyon
04 72 00 06 72
Wednesday to Saturday from 2 p.m. to 7 p.m.
and by appointment outside these hours.
