july 7th to october 5th 2025
18 rue de la Calade — Arles
Sortilèges
In 2025, the Manuel Rivera Ortiz Foundation celebrates its 10th anniversary at Hôtel Blain with a captivating exploration of mystery, magic, and occult worlds. This program invites visitors to cross the threshold of the invisible, delve into the unknown, and question beliefs that defy reason. Between shadow and light, ancient rites, legends, and mystical forces intertwine. Boundaries waver, giving way to a universe where the strange and the marvelous merge.
Each exhibition becomes a passage, an echo of hidden traditions, an immersion into the elusive. Far from certainties, this sensory journey opens the doors of imagination and reveals the aura of mystery. It challenges the concepts of good and evil: what is considered harmful, and what belongs to the spiritual realm? Witchcraft and occult practices, often marginalized, are they expressions of mystical power or acts of defiance against social norms?
Belief and witchcraft are deeply intertwined, traversing history as reflections of our fears and aspirations. The advent of writing and the spread of the Bible marked a turning point, structuring the sacred and the profane. This upheaval led to witch hunts, persecuting those who embodied ancient knowledge, voices outside dogma, and a feared counterpower.
Through the figures of the Black Madonna, Saint Sarah, and Mazu in Taoism, the program examines popular beliefs that, between devotion and transgression, transcend cultures and eras. The figure of the witch, alternately feared and rehabilitated, unfolds into a feminist reading of history: a symbol of power, resistance, and forbidden knowledge.
18 rue de la Calade — Arles
Sortilèges
In 2025, the Manuel Rivera Ortiz Foundation celebrates its 10th anniversary at Hôtel Blain with a captivating exploration of mystery, magic, and occult worlds. This program invites visitors to cross the threshold of the invisible, delve into the unknown, and question beliefs that defy reason. Between shadow and light, ancient rites, legends, and mystical forces intertwine. Boundaries waver, giving way to a universe where the strange and the marvelous merge.
Each exhibition becomes a passage, an echo of hidden traditions, an immersion into the elusive. Far from certainties, this sensory journey opens the doors of imagination and reveals the aura of mystery. It challenges the concepts of good and evil: what is considered harmful, and what belongs to the spiritual realm? Witchcraft and occult practices, often marginalized, are they expressions of mystical power or acts of defiance against social norms?
Belief and witchcraft are deeply intertwined, traversing history as reflections of our fears and aspirations. The advent of writing and the spread of the Bible marked a turning point, structuring the sacred and the profane. This upheaval led to witch hunts, persecuting those who embodied ancient knowledge, voices outside dogma, and a feared counterpower.
Through the figures of the Black Madonna, Saint Sarah, and Mazu in Taoism, the program examines popular beliefs that, between devotion and transgression, transcend cultures and eras. The figure of the witch, alternately feared and rehabilitated, unfolds into a feminist reading of history: a symbol of power, resistance, and forbidden knowledge.
Fotohaus amplifies this program with the theme Controversy and Paradox, inviting an exploration of the tensions and contradictions that arise when beliefs collide with reality. In a French and European society shaped by rationalism, spirituality is often relegated to the periphery of dominant discourse, oscillating between fascination and rejection.
Thus, Sortilèges encourages questioning the established order, uncovering the hidden facets of our cultures, and rehabilitating the mysterious in contemporary society. Today, as some societies witness the decline of figures who challenge norms—whether through feminism, protest, or other forms of singularity—Sortilèges opens a dialogue on these forgotten memories and their resonance in our world.
Western society, by establishing rationalism as the norm, has often rejected or minimized spiritual forms that escape institutional frameworks. Yet, these marginalized beliefs and practices persist, offering an alternative reading of the world. Can we still accept the inexplicable? Are we ready to embrace these traditions, beliefs, and suppressed knowledge to build a more open world? Or are we doomed to perpetuate the exclusion of what transcends our reason?
Artists
Joan ALVADO, Ian CHEIBUB, Maja DANIELS, Alexandre Dupeyron DUPEYRON, Weronika GĘSICKA, Jann HOEFER, Martin LAMBERTY, Laura LAFON CADILHAC, Silvia PRIÓ, Virginie REBETEZ, Wlad SIMITCH, Ann-Christine WOEHRL.
Collectives
FREELENS, INLAND, Laif, The Reporters.
Curators
Anne-Marie BECKMANN, Christel BOGET, Gilles CARGUERAY, Fahr 021.3, Emmanuelle HASCOËT, Klaus KEHRER, David KERN, Gilles MASSOT, Heike OLLERTZ, HILDESHEIM PIROT ZIEGLER, Cornelia SIEBERT.
Art direction
Florent BASILETTI