Larzac, sublime in the lens of Philémon d’Andurain

On October 28, 1971, Michel Debré, then Minister of National Defense, announced the project to extend the Larzac military camp. Then a struggle against this expansion was born which lasted 10 years until the presidential election of François Mitterrand in 1981, who abandoned the project.

A large number of collective organizations emerged from the needs of this struggle. The story begins with “the 103”, the peasants targeted by expropriations to expand the camp. Tools and collective reflections will then imagine another system to manage the lands concerned: GFA, CUMA, SCTL… They will quickly be joined by activists (pacifists, Occitanists, trade unionists, etc.) coming from various backgrounds but driven by the same hopes. Far from being easy, these tools require great personal involvement, consisting of numerous negotiations and sometimes disagreements.

Fifty years later, what has become of these pioneers of the human and agricultural reorganization of the Larzac lands? How do these collective tools continue to work? Who are the new generations who are coming to settle on these farms where the land, agricultural equipment, veterinary care, cheese making and product marketing are managed collectively? The photographer Philémon d’Andurain went to meet them to bear witness to the continuation of this structuring, which has become exemplary.

The opening of the exhibition will take place on Thursday, November 14 at 7 p.m., in the presence of Philémon d’Andurain.