It is a day of profound sorrow, as much as it is a day of recognition. It is a sad autumn day when everyone, and rightly so, celebrates the exceptional man who was Pierre Bergé.
Bernard Buffet, Yves Saint-Laurent at the core of it all, Marrakech and Saint Rémy, the highest of fashion, the celebration of art with exigence of excellence, the militancy for the future and everything that matters. A thousand other things. And so many others of which we cannot speak because there were too many lives, too many beautiful things, and as much passion for the press as there was for beauty.
It is less commonly known, and this is just what I would like to evoke in saying thank you once more, how he helped and supported photography.
It is part of this period in the 1980s when, with Maud Molyneux, Michel Cressole, and Gérard Lefort, Libération was the first daily newspaper to cover fashion shows. Beginning a complicity, he opened the backstage doors to the newspaper’s photographers, starting with Françoise Huguier. This period would culminate with the Yves Saint-Laurent exhibition, first museum exhibition of a living fashion designer, at New York’s Metropolitan Museum in 1983. There are memories of great happiness down the floral-scented aisles and the exceptional moment of the interview with Diana Vreeland. Pierre had convinced her to give an exclusive statement on the exhibition she had conceived to Libération. I illustrated it with the photographs of Deborah Turbeville, who had accompanied me.
Next there was the adventure of the special edition dedicated to Jean Cocteau, at the end of 1983. In addition to the erotic drawings in his collection that Pierre loaned us for the first time, it was he, the patron of this edition that we created with Michel Cressole, who asked Andy Warhol to do the cover, which he funded, of course. A beautiful cover, an interpretation of a portrait by Gisèle Freund. Jean Cocteau, another fidelity of Pierre.
Then, in 1986, when with Zina Rouabah we created Agence VU, it was Pierre Bergé and Marcel Lefranc who generously advanced us the necessary funds for its launch. Next they capitalized them, knowing that they were going to lose the capital. Absolute generosity.
Out of goodwill, and because he was conscious of the stakes that such an initiative could have for the youth of a poor country in the middle of redevelopment, he repeatedly helped the Photo Phnom Penh Festival since the beginning. Its 2017 edition in October will be dedicated to him.
On this day of sorrow, there is only one thing to say. Thank you, Pierre.
Christian Caujolle
An independent curator, Christian Caujolle worked formerly as director of photography at Libération, founded the agency and gallery VU’. He also teaches at the École Nationale Supérieure Louis Lumière in Paris.
