Chalon-sur-Saône: cradle of photography

The Musée Niépce is much more than a general museum of photography, offering to explain all aspects of the practice, from its invention to current developments. Based since 1974 in the former Hôtel des Messageries Royales, a building dating back to the mid-18th century, the museum boasts a unique collection focusing on the origins of the photographic image, but above all deals with the different fields of “photography”, inviting the public on a journey combining objects, original images and new technologies.

Thanks to its laboratory and shooting studio, the museum is also a resource center, a center for the production of works and exhibitions, and a place of residence for artists. Since 1996, the museum has had its own in-house digital photographic laboratory, enabling it to reproduce its permanent collections on digital media and to offer technical expertise for the production of artists-in-residence projects. In this way, the museum’s stock of images and equipment, its documentation (25,000 books) and the laboratory’s know-how can be made available to artists to encourage the creation of new works. Elina Brotherus, JH Engström, Laurent Millet and Tomiko Jones, among others, have defined new paths for their work during residencies here. Peter Knapp, Mac Adams, Charles Fréger and Antoine d’Agata, for example, produce some of their works at the museum in collaboration with the laboratory. The museum’s role as a resource center is defined by its role as a conservatory of ancient techniques, technology watch, collection preservation and contemporary creation.