Lucien Clergue

(From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

Lucien Clergue (born August 14, 1934) is a French photographer.
Clergue was born in Arles. From the age of 7, Lucien Clergue learnt to play the violin. Several years later, his teacher revealed to him that he had nothing more to teach him. From a family of shopkeepers, he could not pursue further studies in a conservatory. In 1949, he learns the rudiments of photography. Four years later, at a corrida in Arles, he showed his photos to Pablo Picasso, who though subdued demanded to see others. Within a year and a half, young Clergue worked with the goal of sending photos to Picasso. During this period he worked on his series of photographs of traveling entertainers, acrobats and harlequins, the « Saltimbanques ». He also worked meanwhile on a series whose subject is carrion.
On 4 November 1955, Lucien Clergue visited Picasso in Cannes. Their friendship lasted near 30 years, until the death of the Master. The book, Picasso my friend retraces the important moments of their relation.
Clergue has taken many photographs of the gypsies of southern France, and he was instrumental in propelling the guitarist Manitas de Plata to fame.
In 1968 he founded, along with his friend Michel Tournier the Rencontres d’Arles photography festival which is held in Arles in July.
Clergue has illustrated books, among these a book by writer Yves Navarre.

In 2007, the city of Arles honored Lucien Clergue and dedicated a retrospective collection of 360 of his photographs dating from 1953 to 2007. He also received the 2007 Lucie Award.
He is named knight of the Légion d'honneur in 2003 and elected member of the Academy of Fine Arts of the Institute of France on the 31 May 2006, on the creation of a new section consecrated to photography. Clergue is the first photographer to enter the Academy to a seat devoted to photography.

Nude

Gypsy boys

1960-1969

Bullfights, Arles

1979

Nu zébré

1997

Pablo Picasso-LA Californie, Cannes

Sol y Ombra II

1989



 

Nu ornithologiaque, Arles/Louvre

 

Nu Zébré, New York

1998

Jean Cocteau et le Sphinx, dans « Le Testament d’Orphée », les Baux de Provence

1959

Les montreurs de singes, rue Genive, Arles

1953

El Cardobès après le descabello, Nîmes

1965

Trio de Saltimbanques in Arles

1955

Nude 6

Nu Zébré, New York, 1997



 

Nu de la rivière aux poissons, Bessèges 2005

2006

Fontaines du Grand Palais, Paris

1963

The Giants

1978

Harlequin, Arles

1955

Nude Zebra, New York

1998

Picasso on the Beach, Cannes

1965

Nu sur les rochers, Bretagne

2001

 

El Cordobes

Picasso in Frejus

3

4

Gitans-Stes. Maries

"Nu Aux Etoiles" - Port Lobos

Genese

Genese