Art bridges the past and present, linking distant worlds and personal stories. Two concurrent museum exhibitions in Cannes and Nice showcase this magic in contrasting yet complementary ways.

At first glance, the spiritual traditions of the Pacific and the urban streets of mid-century America seem to have little in common. And yet, if you look a little closer, they are both a celebration of humanity’s shared stories, and the art of visual storytelling. This is how two unrelated and very different exhibitions in Cannes, “Vanuatu. La voix des ancêtres  (The Voice of the Ancestors) and Nice, “Vivian Maier: Anthology , share a common theme of reflection on what connects us across time and space. And a shared perspective despite contrasting viewpoints is what this highly fragmented world needs most these days.

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Vanuatu: The Voice of the Ancestors
Cannes, Musée des Explorations du Monde
Through 25 May 2025

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Vanuatu has been in the news a lot lately, and sadly not in a good way. A destructive earthquake in December 2024 and persistent political unrests have drawn unwelcome attention to the tiny archipelago in the South Pacific. In the light of such calamity, the current exhibition at Cannes’ Musée des Explorations du Monde is even more meaningful. Vanuatu. La voix des ancêtres offers an in-depth exploration of the cultural heritage of an ancient people in close connection with the world of their ancestors.

Spanning six thematic galleries, it showcases the rich traditions and rituals of the Ni-Vanuatu people through a combination of historical artifacts, contemporary art, and multimedia elements.

Vanuatu expo poster Cannes

Testimonies from three people who lived there highlight the fascination of travelers and collectors, the changes and preservation of customs, missionary evangelization, scientific work, and the destructive force of natural elements and climate change.

The exhibition also celebrates the power of myth through art, the language of ancestors expressed through instruments, focusing on grade societies, ritual objects, and the role of pigs in ceremonies.

Central to the exhibition is a collection of objects acquired by photographer and anthropologist Georges Liotard in the 1980s and 1990s, including ceremonial sculptures, overmodelled ancestor skulls, and ritual insignias.

Vanuatu expo Cannes

Vanuatu expo Cannes

These pieces, alongside rare loans from the Musée d’Arts Africains, Océaniens, Amérindiens  (MAAOA) in Marseille and private collections, offer a comprehensive view of Vanuatu’s artistic and spiritual practices. Notable artifacts include ceremonial objects and a selection of intricately designed sand drawings, recognised by UNESCO as intangible cultural heritage in 2008.

The exhibition is enriched by contemporary contributions, such as sculptor-photographer Laurent Barnavon’s installation evoking a traditional nakamal (men’s house). This structure highlights the symbolic significance of ancestor worship, housing key artifacts like the rambaramp and other ceremonial objects. The rambaramp, a funerary mannequin from Malekula Island, stares back with haunting intensity, its features sculpted from a blend of human skull, clay, and pigments – a testament to the Ni-Vanuatus’ reverence for their ancestors. Photographs taken by Liotard between 1966 and 1976 provide context, capturing a pivotal period in the archipelago’s history before its independence from joint sovereignty between France and the United Kingdom in 1980.

Vanuatu expo Cannes

Vanuatu expo Cannes

Vanuatu, “where one is constantly filled with the diffuse, inexplicable feeling of divinity” (Raga, Le Clézio) is also home to one of the most fascinating and perilous traditional ceremonies in the world: Naghol, or land diving. Practiced on Pentecost Island, it involves men leaping from tall wooden towers with only vines tied to their ankles, serving as a prayer for a bountiful yam harvest. Anthropologist Kirk Huffman has described it as “…more than just a spectacle – it’s a deeply spiritual act, rooted in the land and the cycles of life that sustain the Ni-Vanuatu people. It’s a profound expression of their connection to their environment and ancestors.”

Running until 25 May 2025, Vanuatu. La voix des ancêtres is a rare opportunity to engage with the art, history, and cultural legacy of a unique Pacific society.

Address and event information available here

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Vivian Maier: A Keen Eye for the Enigmatic Beauty of the Everyday
Nice, Musée de la Photographie Charles Nègre
Through 16 March 2025

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Vivian Maier’s black & white exhibition Anthology unearths the quiet genius of a photographer whose work of a lifetime emerged from obscurity into acclaim at age 81, only two years before her death. Featuring 140 photographs and videos, the collection delves into the unique perspective of an artist who transformed the mundane into moments of profound storytelling.

While Vivian Maier was a passionate amateur photographer and filmmaker, her life was far from chasing fame for her work. Born in New York in 1926 into a French and Austro-Hungarian family, she spent a good portion of her youth in France. Later, back in the U.S., she worked over four decades as a nanny in Chicago, roaming the streets with her camera and capturing glimpses of humanity that went unnoticed by others.

1 Vivian Maier presse

2 Vivian Maier presse

3 Vivian Maier presse

8 Vivian Maier presse

In fact, her extraordinary talent remained hidden until 2007 when a cache of over 120,000 negatives and undeveloped films was discovered at an auction. It was the visual diary of a woman who saw art in the everyday – and preserved it for posterity.

What makes Maier’s work resonate today is her ability to document life with an almost cinematic sensibility. Her portraits – of children, workers, and strangers – reflect both compassion and curiosity. She captured fleeting expressions and subtle gestures with an instinct that seemed to freeze time. Her self-portraits are equally compelling, often incorporating shadows or reflections that place her as both observer and participant in her compositions. These introspective images suggest an artist in search of herself while deeply engaged with the world around her.

By the 1960s, Maier expanded her artistic practice to include filmmaking, creating silent, observational works with Super 8 and 16mm cameras. Her films echo her photography’s quiet attentiveness, capturing fleeting moments of motion with the same unflinching eye she turned to still life. The exhibition complements this aspect of her work with a screening of Finding Vivian Maier, a documentary by John Maloof and Charlie Siskel, which delves into her ordinary life and extraordinary posthumous fame.

Vivian Maier’s photographs are a mirror of her era, yet they speak across time,” according to curator Anne Morin, who has championed Maier’s legacy internationally. “They invite us to look closer at the world and at ourselves.” Running through 16 March 2025, Anthology is a testament to Maier’s uncanny ability to find beauty and significance in the overlooked.

Address and event information available here

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Both exhibitions transcend their mediums, offering a rare invitation to explore the infinite forms of human connection. They are offer a profound chance to travel – not just geographically, but across cultures, time periods, and artistic perspectives. And finally they call on us to pause, reflect, reconnect with what it means to be human, and to be inspired to see our own surroundings, and ourselves, with fresh eyes.

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Photo credits:

Lead image by Safal Karki on Unsplash (edited – cropped)

Vanuatu: The Voice of the Ancestors – © Ville de Cannes

Vivian Maier Anthology

Self-portrait, New York, 1954 © Estate of Vivian Maier, Courtesy of Maloof Collection and Howard Greenberg Gallery

Chicago, n.d. © Estate of Vivian Maier, Courtesy of Maloof Collection and Howard Greenberg Gallery

Chicago, May 16, 1957 © Estate of Vivian Maier, Courtesy of Maloof Collection and Howard Greenberg Gallery

New York, June 1954 © Estate of Vivian Maier, Courtesy of Maloof Collection and Howard Greenberg Gallery

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