Elie Kagan

I did not know what was in store when I was contacted in summer 1999 by Judith Kagan, daughter of the photographer Eli Kagan who had died in the January of that year. Several times we left each other messages on answering machines, but finally we met. And early in the autumn I finally entered the mythical den, in Paris, of Elie Kagan, born in 1928. His eclectic world, shaped over the years, overwhelmed me. A blizzard of pictures pinned or stuck to the walls, political and religious posters, pamphlets, poems, postcards, press passes, drawings by friends such as Plantu or Tim and photographs. On the other hand his photo lab was completely bare: Kagan’s world already tidied away. Along the corridor, bookcases still packed with political literature.

Then, in a large room bathed in sunlight that filtered through the closed venetian blinds, dozens of boxes on the floor all packed up for their final journey. Crammed full of prints, contact prints, slides, negatives, albums, newspaper cuttings, contracts for reportages, payment slips filed by year, pins, diaries with business appointments. The whole photographic life of Elie Kagan.

It is well-known that Elie Kagan became famous at the beginning of his career for the striking pictures he took openly, with a flash, at night, of the police beating up Algerians working in France who had come to Paris to take part in demonstrations. The only newspaper that dared to publish these pictures was ‘Temoignage chretien’ (Christian witness), a publication he remained faithful to all his life. He got his press pass at the end of that year.

From that moment on he photographed more indiscriminately than ever, haughtily ignoring conventional rules of composition and recording intensely and insatiably the world around him with an almost youthful enthusiasm, all the while turning his back on what fashion dictated. His sense of justice, or rather obsession, led him to take photos of life in the streets, especially social outcasts for whom he had particular affection. He was an activist who fought for an ideal society, a better world. Independent almost to the point of being an anarchist, he was the companion of Mouna Aguigui and never really belonged to a press agency as such. He saw himself as a ‘politically committed reporter’.

He was obsessed by his Jewish origins, so it was hardly surprising to see him fighting alongside Serge Klarsfeld. It was moving to see them wear the yellow star on the day of the funeral of Xavier Wallat, who had been Commissioner for Jewish affairs in Vichy France between 1940 and 1944. After an accident in 1994 he had to stop working for a while and to leave Paris for Briancon. He was profoundly affected by this: it comes out in the photos he took at that time and until the end of his life, which are imbued with a sort of lack of committment which was probably unconscious. His spontaneity faded. So, with this generous and prodigious donation our collection now covers almost all of the 20th century, painting a rich photographic panorama that will give future historians a new and extraordinary interpretation of its history and its making.

Thérèse Blondet-Bisch