Prix Viviane Esders

Prize Presentation

After more than 40 years devoted to photography as a gallery owner, expert and collector, Viviane Esders decided to deepen her commitment to photography, particularly to artists whose careers have not received the recognition they deserve.

Fueled by her enduring passion for the medium, she created the Prix Viviane Esders and an endowment fund. While the Prize honours outstanding European photographers, the endowment fund has a broader mission: preserving her collection of over 2300 photographs and fostering the appreciation and dissemination of photographic art.

Le Prix Viviane Esders 

Driven by the idea of discovering or rediscovering a lifetime of work, the aim of the Prize is to highlight the careers of remarkable European artists, deserving recognition and a real financial support to pursue their projects. The Prize stands out for the generosity of its endowment of €60,000 in total and its European scope.

Each year, the Viviane Esders Award honors the career of a photographer:

• aged 60 and over,
• European,
• Professional,
• Independent,
• active for several decades,
• demonstrating a personal style and a distinctive artistic approach.

The Jury, accompanied by Viviane Esders and made up of six personalities from the world of art and culture honor:

• One Laureate with a 50 000€ grant including €10,000 towards the production of a book
• Two finalists with a 5 000€ grant

One Laureate with a 50 000€ grant including €10,000 towards the production of a book

Viviane Esders

In 1976, after graduating from HEC, Viviane Esders flew to New York. As part of the United States Bicentennial mission, she worked with Roy Liechtenstein, Robert Rauschenberg and Tom Wesselmann. She met Andy Warhol, who had lived in her mother’s flat in Paris, and became part of the Factory, where she met Robert Mapplethorpe.

The emergence of photography galleries in New York encouraged her to open a space dedicated to this art form in Paris. In the 1980s and 1990s, she exhibited international photographers such as Sabine Weiss, William Wegman, Sandy Skoglund, Luigi Ghirri, Gabriele Basilico, Lisette Model and Arno Rafael Minkkinen for the first time in Paris. At the same time, she curated exhibitions such as Le Ruban photographique de la Révolution française, Grande Halle de la Villette, 1989; L’Hommage à Roland Barthes, Mois de la Photo, 1990; Expériences photographiques russes, Mois de la Photo, 1992.

At the request of auctioneers, in particular Pierre Cornette de Saint-Cyr and Jacques Tajan, she set up her appraisal firm to organise auctions and appraise private and institutional collections.

Viviane Esders has published three books on photographic portraiture: À la Recherche du Père, Paris Audiovisuel, 1992; Nos Mères, Éditions de La Martinière, 1997 and La Photo du Président, Hazan, 2002, the same year the Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres (Knight of the Order of Arts and Letters) was awarded to her.

In order to continue to affirm her commitment and pass on her passion to a wider public, Viviane Esders is now creating an endowment fund and launching the Viviane Esders Prize. At the same time, her collection, one of the most important in Europe, will be revealed to the public in a vast programme of exhibitions.