Denis Westhoff, son of the writer Françoise Sagan, inaugurates the first exhibition dedicated to his mother, at Point du Vue, Saturday. The opportunity to (re) discover the life of the author.
“To think about it, the only milestones of my chronology would be the dates of my novels […]”.
As a guiding thread, these few words from Behind the Shoulder have sequenced the walkways of the Point of View, the establishment of the waterfront that hosts his first exhibition devoted to Françoise Sagan , currently in preparation.
“I wanted to rehabilitate his work and we do not stop at these jokes. This exhibition is Sagan through her books, the different stages of her life when she was writing, which is why the exhibition is punctuated with these moments, it is the will to put forward his novels, “says Denis Westhoff, son of the writer.”
Unpublished documents
At the origin of this retrospective, the inauguration of the media library Françoise Sagan , in Paris, spring 2015. “I was asked for this event, says Denis Westhoff, the person who took care of it proposed to the city of Paris to do an exhibition with the photos of Roger-Viollet agency, Paris Match , I thought it was a great idea. From there, we found a theme.
Orchestrated by Denis Westhoff in collaboration with the municipality of Eauville, the exhibition, which begins next Saturday, offers to the visitor’s eyes fragments of the public and private life of the author. Baptized La Vie en liberté, the writing in requirement , it brings to light documents hitherto unpublished .
“We have recovered a huge archive from the France Soir newspaper, when they left Réaumur street, in Paris, they donated their photos to the city, some are totally unpublished.”
Denis Westhoff then interrogates the boxes of archival funds gleaned in order to get his hands on the clichés that have seized the literary life of his mother. Then add a series of private documents . Deauville will finally provide its nest egg, built in recent years thanks to the archives of Paris Match magazine provided by the former photographer of the weekly, Benno Graziani.
“Since 1954, Françoise Sagan is there, we find it every five or six numbers, it punctuates the news,” said Philippe Normand, head of the cultural department of Deauville. Among the 74 documents on display are two portraits of the author made by Robert Doisneau in 1956 and 1994. A projection of the short film Encore une hiver , directed by Françoise Sagan in 1975, is also scheduled for Sunday 25th February at 3 pm, at the Point du Vue.
Sagan on the Côte Fleurie
Novels and original manuscripts, including that of an unfinished work, correspondences, 45 rpm – Françoise Sagan wrote for Juliette Gréco and Marcel Mouloudji -, notes and translations of books are for Philippe Normand “all the artistic foam of the literary life of Françoise Sagan “.
A literary life that, for 45 years , was intoxicated by the spray of the Côte fleurie, where Sagan took the time to exist, far from the casinos and nocturnal escapades, reductive and too often contiguous to the author of Hello sadness . Because if the Deauville of decades 50-60 likes to maintain the memory of its sleepless nights, of this prowess with the roulette one morning of August 59, Françoise Sagan had found here especially points and a haven to live there its imperious freedom .
Exhibition Françoise Sagan:
From February 10 to March 11, open from Wednesday to Sunday.
Point de Vue, 7 boulevard de la Mer – Deauville. Entrance: € 3
Opening on February 17 at 6.30 pm
Information: 02.31.14.02.02
