The 55th edition of Les Rencontres d’Arles, titled ‘Beneath the Surface’, invites the visitor into a world of complex and interweaving narratives. The poster for this year’s edition features an image by Spanish photographer Cristina de Middel, in which a figure with a long braid stands thigh-deep in water in a mountain landscape directly in front of a dead tree, whose branches look like an extension of her hair. The image is taken from De Middel’s series ‘Journey to the Center’ (2021), on display at the Frères-Prêcheurs church in Arles, which was inspired by Jules Verne’s classic sci-fi novel Journey to the Center of the Earth (1864). As so often in her practice, De Middel’s photographs interweave fact and fiction, recasting Verne’s narrative to depict the migratory crossing from Mexico to California as an heroic expedition.

As it has every summer since 1970, Les Rencontres d’Arles will once again be showcasing a vast array of photography across the city between July 1 to September 29 – from a retrospective of celebrated American photographer Mary Ellen Mark to Uraguchi Kusukazu’s acclaimed images of Japanese pearl divers. In addition to exhibitions, other highlights of the 2024 edition include the long-awaited return of the emerging artists program OFF, which this year is the result of a collaboration between La Kabine visual arts center and Fisheye magazine, and several evenings of screenings in the courtyard of the Archbishop’s Palace and at the Théâtre Antique.

To help readers navigate this photographic abundance, Art Basel has selected presentations by five must-see emerging artists. And between shows, don’t forget to stop by Patisserie Masaki Yamamoto to sample their raspberry and poppy macarons or book a table at Inari to try chef Céline Pham’s extraordinary cuisine du marché.

Tshepiso Mazibuko
‘To Believe in Something that Will Never Happen’
Espace Monoprix

This year, the Louis Roederer Foundation Discovery Award has relocated from the historic center of Arles to Espace Monoprix, a venue on the first floor of the supermarket whose curved facade, typical of 1960s commercial architecture, is immediately visible upon leaving the city’s main train station. One of this year’s nine finalists is Tshepiso Mazibuko, a South African photographer born in 1995 in the township of Thokoza, near Johannesburg, who trained at the Market Photo Workshop photography school and attended the Of Soul and Joy program. The title of her presentation, ‘Ho tshepa ntshepedi ya bontshepe’ (2017–2018), is an evocative Sesotho proverb meaning ‘To believe in something that will never happen’. Through a gallery of compositionally tight, direct-to-camera portraits, Mazibuko recounts the story of the Born Free Generation: the first Black South Africans to be born after apartheid. Photographed as they go about their daily lives, with no attempt made to conceal the latent violence of their environment, the artist’s young subjects appear sometimes proud, sometimes frustrated. Mazibuko offers an uncompromising portrayal of disillusioned youth, in a country that still remains fundamentally divided.

Randa Mirza
‘Beirutopia’
Maison des Peintres

Born in 1978 in Beirut, but now based in Marseille, Randa Mirza was the winner of the Photo Folio Review 2023. Her monographic exhibition, ‘Beirutopia’, delivers a visual essay that combines biographical elements with a critical appraisal of her home country, the history of which is pervaded by violence. The show features seven works produced between 2000 and 2022, including her most notable series, the eponymous ‘Beirutopia’ (2010–2019), in which she merges reality and fantasy to generate a cynical vision of a Beirut designed and governed by luxury real-estate companies. To destabilize this myth of an affluent city located at the crossroads between East and West, Mirza’s images present these fictional buildings within the harsh context of their current reality, opening up a moment for reflection in a country mired in political struggle.

Stephen Dock
‘Echoes’
Cruise

One of the highlights of this year’s Les Rencontres d’Arles is ‘Echoes’, an exhibition by self-taught French photographer Stephen Dock, whose work addresses one of the most pressing questions of our time: How can we convey the reality of contemporary conflict in images without capitulating to classic tropes of visual mythology? Since 2011, Dock has been photographing wars, and their resulting humanitarian and migration crises, across Europe and the Middle East. This dense display sees the author delve into the vast photographic archives he has assembled over the past 15 years to present a broad-ranging thesis on modern war. Rather than seeking to convey the harsh reality of a specific conflict at a particular moment in time, however, Dock has manipulated his images, both digital and analog, playing with pixels and paper alike to turn documentary testament into artistic medium. Denying the evidential status of his photographs, Dock expands and reframes his images to offer an alternative vision of this significant yet endlessly complex subject.

Diego Moreno
‘L’Engagement’
Manuel Rivera-Ortiz Foundation

As part of its group exhibition ‘L’Engagement’, the Manuel Rivera-Ortiz Foundation is showing the curious and incisive work of Diego Moreno. Born in Mexico in 1992, Moreno employs photography, collage, and painting to explore topics ranging from Catholicism to familial relationships to the unconscious. In the series ‘Malign Influences’ (2020–ongoing), for instance, the artist manipulates images from his family’s photo albums to depict an alternate reality peopled with monstrous beings. Faces in old portraits are doctored or obscured with grotesque masks to render their subjects evil characters. In disturbing works that disrupt the iconography of traditional representations of family to expose their hidden secrets, Moreno’s subjects proclaim their difference, refusing to be silenced by religious or societal norms.

Adrien Bitibaly
Mirage, 12, rue de Vernon

A must for all photobook enthusiasts, Mirage publishing fair, hosted by Librairie du Palais, provides a platform for photographers whose work circulates primarily in printed format. Across two venues – 12, rue de Vernon in addition to the bookshop itself – the fair features a program of signings, discussions, and screenings, as well as two exhibitions by Maria Stamenković Herranz and Adrien Bitibaly. The latter presents his black-and-white series ‘Quatre yeux’ (Four Eyes, 2023), published by Palais Books, in which he returns to his native Burkina Faso to uncover the origins of the popular practice of witchcraft. Bitibaly travelled the country meeting and photographing traditional priests and women designated as ‘witches’.