Between reconstruction of the night of horror he experienced when he was a kid in a hotel in Avignon, and his subsequent reconstruction, thephotographer Jean-Michel André offers his photo exhibition “Room 207” at the Hospice Comtesse, until February 2.
The news item made the front pages of quite a few newspapers. One night in August 1983 in the Sofitel hotel in Avignon, seven people (four employees and three customers) were brutally killed by “criminals” during an attempted hold-up. At least, that’s what emerged from the investigation which left some unclear areas.
That night, Jean-Michel André was in the room next to the one where the carnage took place. His father is one of the victims. He was 7 years old, and losing his memory.
“Room 207”, an exhibition and an autofiction
In his exhibition “Room 207” to be discovered at the Hospice Comtesse* in Lille before February 2, the now photographer offers two things: a reconstruction, more or less defective, of the night of the tragedy but also of the places “that he could, or could have, crossed with his father“; and reconstruction after this trauma.
In a large room of the museum, his photographs of landscapes, birds and his father mix with press archives, family objects and investigative elements. We see his memory reconstructed and reinvented in fragments, we feel his feeling of mourning, we try to analyze his psychic repair, full of poetry through his photographs.
The exhibition is short but intense and to tell you the truth, his photos are successful: his photo book “Chambre 207” (Actes Sud) won the Nadar 2024 prize.
*The exhibition is part of the Hors des Murs program of the Institute of Photography, which closed for renovations and is due to reopen in 2026.
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