ACCEPTE-LE

Please support my first photographic album «Aceita-o», to be released next fall 2016 by The Eyes Publishing.

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07/19/2016

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€5,159

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August 31, 2016

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ACCEPTE-LE

<img alt="Page_soeur_album_cg_050516-1463749459" src="https://d3v4jsc54141g1.cloudfront.net/uploads/project_image/image/318839/PAGE_SOEUR_ALBUM_CG_050516-1463749459.jpg"> « Aceita-o - Um album português » is the album of a Portuguese family that I have created piece by piece. The story takes place in Portugal, in Guinea Bissau and in Angola, two former Portuguese colonies, during the 20th century. I conceived and realised this book between 2014 and 2016. It will be published by the Eyes Publishing, a high quality photo book publisher based in France. The international Festival of Photography Encontros da Imagem 2016 will unveil the book as well as its first exhibition, during the opening week between September 21st and 25th, in Braga, Portugal. This photographic story is told by a woman in her fifties and takes the shape of a family photo album. Two letters, short captions and a few documents lead the viewer to discover these 90 intimate photographs from the 20's to the end of the 70's. In 1979, in Lisbon, Fernanda makes the album to reveal an overwhelming secret on their origins to her elder son, who has cut all ties with her family and his country. Addressing him from beginning to end in the album, she revisits her own family images next to some photographs received a year before from another woman, Catarina, who, in an intense letter, claims to be her sister from Africa. Our heroin takes a new look on her siblings and discovers an entire world. This scattered family can also look at the history of its own country, here the Portugal with its fallen colonial empire, its dictatorship and its violence. Also, the viewer faces the photographic illusion in a book where the true and the fake do not contradict. A family secret is revealed twice. The first silence of a woman, the mystery of an unknown father, of a distant sister, the unexplained separation of the son : what is not said floats at the surface of the pages of this album. <img alt="Im1-1463748997" src="https://d3v4jsc54141g1.cloudfront.net/uploads/project_image/image/318833/IM1-1463748997.jpg"> <img alt="Cgaille_album_voies_off-1464101477" src="https://d3v4jsc54141g1.cloudfront.net/uploads/project_image/image/320352/CGAILLE_ALBUM_VOIES_OFF-1464101477.jpg"> A very personal project born in a country that is not mine In August 2014, I moved in Lisbon, a city I knew nothing about. Taken by the mystery of the city, I one day found the historical flea market, the Feira da Ladra, where I went almost every week for months. Slowly, I pursued an invisible line. I first bought one photograph, then another, and a third one, and so on, choosing them carefully, until I collected dozens of anonymous small images, with no proven connexions. These images are family photographs holding a collective good that I would like to understand, the memory of a people.. It took me months to collect them, searching in the boxes of various sellers. May be I tried to bypass the language barrier by looking at what the pictures had to say. They were first and foremost a contemplative medium through which I reflected, dreamy and moved at the same time. Then, I had to tame them and give a new existence to these people under the form of fictional narrative. For weeks, I lived with my collection physically close to me, mentally writing my scenario. The virgin pages of the old album would change all the time. The time spent and lost in the middle of these faces and these situations could not be made shorter nor faster or slower. I asked myself : whose memory am I talking about ? When I looked at all of them, I had the uncanny sensation of a resemblance between these people. I started from what I saw. Accepting the unknown, my thoughts took me towards this other one Portuguese, appearing through family life and personal memory abandoned one day at the flea markets. The accidental encounter with a face on an old photograph ignited a dream and spread the fire. <img alt="Fiance_album_cgaille_050516-1463748944" src="https://d3v4jsc54141g1.cloudfront.net/uploads/project_image/image/318832/FIANCE_ALBUM_CGAILLE_050516-1463748944.jpg"> <img alt="Mariage_album_cgaille_050516-1463574884" src="https://d3v4jsc54141g1.cloudfront.net/uploads/project_image/image/317779/MARIAGE_ALBUM_CGAILLE_050516-1463574884.jpg"> A personal and original contribution by Historian Filipa Lowndes Vicente complements this book. Researcher at the Institute of Social Sciences of the University of Lisbon, her research fields incorporate the production of knowledge in the 19th and 20th centuries, written and visual material in colonial context, and the history of travellings, photography, museums and exhibitions. Extract: "Quase dez anos depois, estou muito mais interessada nos despojos da intimidade. Já perdi o pudor de tomar posse dos fragmentos da vida dos outros. Mas ainda me entristecem os molhos de fotografias à venda em caixas de cartão no chão da feira da ladra. Agora que vivo em Lisboa, em frente à principal feira de velharias de Lisboa, é aqui que compro mais fotografias. Pego nelas, soltas, e vejo-as depressa, colocando-as atrás umas das outras à medida que as vejo, como fazíamos em crianças com as colecções de cromos e as trocas com os amigos. Já tenho, já tenho, já tenho, não tenho, quero. Agora as palavras são outras. Não me interesa, não me interessa, não me interessa. Interessa-me. Quero. Vou comprar. "2 euros duas". "Faça 1.50..." "Está bem, leve-as". Levo-as. Muitas vezes, não porque o tema se encaixe nos meus temas de trabalho, mas porque algo na fotografia me chamou a atenção, o tal punctum de que falava Barthes. Algo que nos atrai mas não sabemos bem porquê." <img alt="Africa_album_cgaille_050516-1463574414" src="https://d3v4jsc54141g1.cloudfront.net/uploads/project_image/image/317764/AFRICA_ALBUM_CGAILLE_050516-1463574414.jpg"> "e logo me fascinou este objecto inventado, esta ficção feita de palavras e de imagens unidas numa narrativa que não é verdade mas podia ser. Senti que este álbum era o fim de um caminho. Para a sua autora era uma forma de dar sentido à sua nova vida em Lisboa, de ser menos estrangeira ou, pelo menos, compreender melhor a história do lugar onde vive. Para as fotografias era também o fim de percurso. Os objectos também viajam, sozinhos ou com pessoas. Onde foram tiradas as fotografias? Portugal, sim. Mas também em África, nas ex-colónias quando ainda não eram ex. Como é que sabemos? Não sabemos. Em algumas aparecem brancos e negros, por vezes os negros em posições subalternas, como aquela em que um criado serve um chá à senhora bem vestida. O homem vestido de soldado, como tantos na Guerra Colonial. Mas a história colonial está também nas palavras e na distância. Intimidade e subversão da intimidade. As pessoas que estão nas fotografias não são actores, isto não é uma fotonovela dos anos 1970. São pessoas verdadeiras apropriadas para assumirem uma personagem de ficção, sem saberem que o são. A sua vida não lhes foi retirada porque ela existiu. Aquelas pessoas existiram, estão ali como elas próprias. Nós é que não as conhecemos. E por isso vemos e lemos a sua história nos interstícios dessa duplicidade irresolúvel entre a verdade e a ficção. As fotografias, como as pessoas ali visíveis, tiveram assim uma segunda vida. Mas e se estiverem vivas? E se os seus filhos as reconhecerem na segunda vida que elas não sabem que têm? Há, inevitavelmente, uma dimensão ética na apropriação de fotografias que não são nossas. Sobretudo quando elas pertencem a um tempo próximo. Como todos os historiadores, antropólogos ou outros estudiosos que se interessam por fotografia enquanto documento, objecto, narrativa, imagem, também Céline teve que se debater com as fronteiras delicadas entre o usar e o abusar, entre o reflectir e o reproduzir, entre o ouvir as vozes dos que não têm voz e o falar pela sua boca. São elas e eles que ali estão. Mas podíamos ser nós. <img alt="Page_famille_album_cgaille_050516-1463749047" src="https://d3v4jsc54141g1.cloudfront.net/uploads/project_image/image/318834/PAGE_FAMILLE_ALBUM_CGAILLE_050516-1463749047.jpg"> <img alt="Catarina_the_album_cgaille_050516-1463574499" src="https://d3v4jsc54141g1.cloudfront.net/uploads/project_image/image/317766/CATARINA_THE_ALBUM_CGAILLE_050516-1463574499.jpg"> Extrait de la lettre de Catarina "Fernanda, Tu não me conheces. Sou Catarina, tua irmã de Africa. Nasci em 1917 em Bissau. A família do meu pai vive lá desde o fim do século passado. Somos africanos, brancos, da Guiné. Pertenço ao passado, o do império português desfeito. Vim de uma parte tão pequena deste Império, não olhava para o mundo como me obrigam a vê-lo agora. Tínhamos tudo e agora não temos nada. Não percebo o que se passa comigo e sinto-me desenraizada, em caso nenhum “retornada”. Ainda não consigo aceitar. Junto com esta carta encontrarás fotografias minhas, do meu marido José que foi assassinado lá, e dos meus filhos Carlota e Vasco que daqui a pouco tempo estarão sós. Encontrarás fotografias do nosso pai e da família da Cunha, entre outros documentos. Não resta muita coisa do tempo vivido na Guiné. Tivemos de fugir durante o verão de 1974 e, durante a viagem, mais da metade das nossas malas se perderam. Com elas desapareceu a nossa própria vida. Chegamos à metrópole, esta terra desconhecida. Vivemos num hotel de Lisboa durante meses, fizemos um acordo com os funcionários do IARN, até que nos puseram fora. Fomos para a Madeira, porque o arquipélago fica mais proximo das costas da Guiné, do nosso paraíso perdido." <img alt="Guine_1919-1464090659" src="https://d3v4jsc54141g1.cloudfront.net/uploads/project_image/image/320229/GUINE_1919-1464090659.jpg"> The evolution of the project Beside the progressive acquisition of the photographs, my curiosity for this country was fed with readings on history, novels and poetry of Portuguese authors, the discovery of documentary or fiction movies and radio documentaries. Almost fifty years of Salazar dictatorship and the fall of the Portuguese empire, a direct consequence of the violent colonial wars in Africa during the sixties, muzzled the individual memories and blurred the collective memory, despite the Carnation Revolution and the change of regime in 1974. Forty years later, this recent past is still a touchy subject and very often, silence remains. Stranger to this, I chose to work around the silence that covers the crash of this lost world, but whose traces exist and are tangible. This is about the collective memory, the one of Portugal first, but also of the European memory, scarred by the tragedies and the immigration waves. Last but not least, my interest in these images lies in the fact that they are a collective legacy and offer the possibility to talk universally of privacy. I recaptured the history of these people and gave them a role and a place to be in my story, should the course of their own trajectory be changed by my intervention. <img alt="Rodrigo_album_cgaille_050516-1464101273" src="https://d3v4jsc54141g1.cloudfront.net/uploads/project_image/image/320349/RODRIGO_ALBUM_CGAILLE_050516-1464101273.jpg"> <img alt="Ferias_album_cgaille050516-1464101754" src="https://d3v4jsc54141g1.cloudfront.net/uploads/project_image/image/320358/FERIAS_ALBUM_CGAILLE050516-1464101754.jpg"> In July 2015, I met Vincent Marcilhacy, the director of The Eyes Publishing, who was touched by this strange object. He offered me right away to create the book together. Then Angela Ferreira, the artistic director of the festival Encontros da Imagem, also supported my project inviting me to create the exhibition in the 2016 edition. Along the way, my second year in Lisbon represented an intense work to enhance and sharpen the book. Thanks to this album, I met new people who became very important, like the historian Filipa Lowndes Vicente. The intellectual thoroughness and personal awareness of her words enlighten this book. From my discussions in Portugal with publishers, curators, book sellers, photographers, anthropologists, flea market sellers Lisbon habitants, a precious matter came up to the surface and I hope that the pages of this album are filled with it. <img alt="Revo_album_cgaille_050516-1463574733" src="https://d3v4jsc54141g1.cloudfront.net/uploads/project_image/image/317775/REVO_ALBUM_CGAILLE_050516-1463574733.jpg">

Allocation of funds

<img alt="Baigneuses_album_portugais_cgaille-1463575719" src="https://d3v4jsc54141g1.cloudfront.net/uploads/project_image/image/317794/BAIGNEUSES_ALBUM_PORTUGAIS_CGAILLE-1463575719.jpg"> Release date Thanks to your support, « Aceita-o » (Accept-it) will be published by The Eyes Publishing, by the end of September 2016 on time for the opening of my exhibition within the Festival Encontros da Imagem, in Braga, Portugal, before it comes to Paris. <img alt="Aceitao_couv_visuel_2-1464164771" src="https://d3v4jsc54141g1.cloudfront.net/uploads/project_image/image/320639/AceitaO_Couv_Visuel_2-1464164771.jpg"> Specs - Photographs : collection Céline Gaille -Texts : Céline Gaille ; Filipa Lowndes Vicente, Historian, researcher at the Institute of Social Sciences of the University of Lisbon - - Book in 3 Languages : in French with translations in Portuguese and English - About 100 photographs and ancillary documents - 112 pages texts and images - Printing in Four-Colour printing - Format : 29 x 22 cm italian format - Hardcover book Update With Vincent Marcilhacy, we worked for months to preserve the nature of the old album and transform it into a published book. This book is complex, offers different layers of reading, just like an album has opaque pages and translucent ones. The translations are on going and the layout is stabilised. We will be soon ready to go on print. The book budget is about 15 000 euros. The significant investment of the publisher is not enough to ensure the publication of the book. So I chose to launch this KissKiss BankBankof 5000 euros to pay the graphic designer, the retoucher, cover a part of the costs of the different papers and of the high quality printing. Also, the possibility to produce a limited edition up to 15 copies, signed, numbered, filled with images like in a real album, will depend on this fundraising. The higher the amount collected, the better the chance we have to make a subtle book, rich in feelings, of a high quality printing, dealing with universal subjects: the private memory and its place in collective memory, the use of the “found photographs” to recapture the silence and the oblivions of the Nations, the question of the origins seen as a journey between fiction and reality. It is bliss to contemplate these images from far away that resemble us so much sometimes. By supportting this project, you participate in a unique contemporary creation and you contribute to the preservation of the private legacy of our culture. Thank you As fotografias constantes da obra foram compradas pela Autora na Feira da Ladra, em Lisboa, de outubro de 2014 a março de 2016. As fotografias foram adquiridas uma a uma, a diferentes vendedores, ao longo deste período. Apesar dos esforços realizados pela Autora, não foi possível identificar as pessoas retratadas. A história veiculada na obra é completamente ficcional, pelo que não há qualquer relação entre as pessoas retratadas e os nomes que lhes são atribuídos, as opiniões, ligações familiares e quaisquer outras assumpções ou interpretações da obra.

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