Le Bal (arts centre)


Le Bal is an independent arts centre in Paris. It focuses on documentary photography, video, cinema and new media through exhibitions, production, book publishing, talks and debates.
Le Bal has around 350 m² of exhibition space divided across two floors; a bookshop, Le Bal Books; and café, Le Bal Café. It is located off Place de Clichy at 6 Impasse de la Défense, 18th arrondissement, 75018, Paris. It opened in September 2010. Its director is Diane Dufour.

Details

The building is a former 1930s dance hall called Chez Isis.
Le Bal co-publishes two or three books each year, including L’Anti-collection, a limited-edition artist’s book which it jointly publishes with the Centre national des arts plastiques, and Les Carnets du Bal.
Le Bal’s educational platform, La Fabrique du Regard, has run programmes since 2008 for young people aged 8–18, especially from disadvantaged areas of Paris and its suburbs, to critically look at images.
Le Bal Books is run by Sébastian Hau.
Le Bal Café is operated by Alice Quillet, Anna Trattles and Anselme Blayney. It serves a French take on traditional British cuisine.
Since 2010 Le Bal has been involved with the annual Prix des Ecoles d’Art SFR Jeunes Talents / Le Bal. It is a competition open to art school students and former students who graduated less than three years before entering. It carries a 5000 Euro prize intended to support the winner for two years in making or completing a documentary photography project.
Antoine D'Agata's Anticorps, a catalogue published by Le Bal and Éditions Xavier Barral for his retrospective at Le Bal, won the Rencontres d'Arles Author’s Book Award in 2013. In 2015, the book Images of Conviction: The Construction of Visual Evidence won the Photography Catalogue of the Year award in the Paris Photo–Aperture Foundation PhotoBook Awards.

Exhibitions