Souvenir de la Tourte de Besse is a book of photographs celebrating bread and mountains. The bread is Yves Saint-Pierre’s, and the mountain is the Oisans. In 1993, using stones from a village ruin and trees from a family plot, Yves and Véronique built a bakery in Besse, at an altitude of 1450 meters. In the book, the traditional gestures and the landscape in which they take place are brought together as a single material, under the powerful light of August and December.
Yves Saint-Pierre has devoted thirty years to bread-making, embodying an ancestral tradition for others and for himself. Passed on by the women of Besse, in this entirely manual practice, everything is physical and everything is alive. Perpetuating a tradition is a choice you make every day, and you accept its intransigence and discipline. At one time, it was the only way to work, but for Yves it was a will, the choice of total practice.
Clara Prioux photographed the Tourte de Besse for two summers and one winter, in the run-up to the last batch. In addition to a selection of fifty black and white photographs, the book contains two previously unpublished texts by Yves Saint-Pierre.
Club d’Histoire Locale is an independent publishing structure founded in 2020 by Clara Prioux as an extension of her photography and publishing practice. Club d’Histoire Locale publishes documentary photography, artist’s editions and makes objects. The structure also seeks out initiatives and practices in specific territories, in the manner of a genuine local history club.
On the front of the 13, rue de l’Abbaye :
After Pablo Jomaron and Vieciel & Cremers, Clara Prioux will take over the front of the bookshop with a selection of images from her latest book.
on view until 31.12.2024
