Photographs taken by Amélie Cabocel.
Residence of 8 weeks conducted in 2025.
Residence carried by Stimultania.
Support by the Ministry of Culture as part of the Capsule program.
With the support from the gîte An olive tree in the stars.
"Spaces of one's own" is born from encounters with people who identify as women, who invent forms to form groups, places of mutual support, ways of living their lives as they see fit and for themselves, in politicized friendships…
A choir, a garden, a single-sex gym, a cafe, a motorcycle, a maternity ward, a bedroom, unionism, one's own inner life: so many physical or metaphorical spaces where we gather, where voices rise, where we exist as we wish.
Some carry within them stories marked by the political upheavals of the world, others resist in their daily lives. All create territories, intimate or collective, in which to exist freely.
This project engages in a dialogue with A Room of One's Own, in which Virginia Woolf asserts that women's freedom to think and create presupposes a material, symbolic, and social space of their own. In Spaces of One's Own, each photograph sketches a portrait of these collectively won freedoms.
Journal
An autumn day in Givors, all shades of gray. The Rhône, full, seen from above, crossed by the highway. The sounds of water, wind, and cars mingling. The sprawling, multiple city. The tightly packed stars opening onto the rest of the territory. Concrete and nature. The cold outside, the warmth found inside. These are my first impressions of the city. And a question: where do we find collective activity today in Givors? The intuition of the existence of numerous islands of sociability, leisure, escape, resistance… I think of the forgotten, faded songs of the workers of this former working-class town. I think of a short film, seen a few years ago, whose name escapes me, in which the local choir of octogenarians transforms itself into a place of resistance against capitalism. Finally, I think of a feminist choir which, by paving the way, is shifting boundaries. What about the voices of Givors? Do the songs of the old ones resonate with the present era? What stories do the choir members carry deep within themselves, and what actions are they prepared to take to ensure their voices carry to the heart of the city and even beyond its borders?
[Amélie Cabocel, December 2024]
© Amélie Cabocel, 2025
One of my first impressions of Givors was to sense that in this city long shaped by struggle, the collective is still bubbling, no doubt in unexpected places. With my perspective and true to my way of connecting, I ask myself: how do we create a collective today? Where do people who identify as women meet, get involved in Givors? I begin by researching shared spaces (a garden, a choir, a gym with slots reserved for women, etc.) to understand and open dialogue. While searching in parallel in the municipal archives, I found few traces of the history of women in Givors. I then think about my work in such a way as to bring out what seems to have been kept out of the frame. Together, with the people I meet, we imagine photographs. I take their portraits on film, slowly, and record their voices: What is your fight today? Each image becomes a fragment of a shared narrative, a story of commitments and connections. The project weaves together working-class memories and feminist struggles, and explores the innermost resistance. Through images and stories, it attempts to build something common, to transmit, and to stand together.
[Amélie Cabocel, 2025]
© Amélie Cabocel, 2025
Meet at Place des Deux Joseph in Givors
Presentation at the closing party of Stimultania Givors, March 2026. Images © Arsène Ott, Jérémy Martinez & Stimultania.
Visual artist and director, Amélie Cabocel develops research around questions related to bodies and the social body. Her approach is located at the intersection between still images, moving images and sound. She relies on a documentary approach proposing other imaginaries and representations, other possibilities, placing queer and minority stories at its center. Opening spaces for expression and collective creation is at the heart of her practice.
His work is regularly published and shown at festivals and exhibitions in France and internationally (Les Instants vidéo, Marseille; Dok Leipzig, Leipzig; Synesthésie, Saint-Denis; Stimultania, Strasbourg; Maison de la Photographie Robert Doisneau, Gentilly; Casa Tres Patios, Medellín; Alliance française de Polanco, México; Centro de Arte Contemporaneo, Quito).