The 2026 jury
Jean-Claude Desmonts
It was a teacher who "inoculated me with the photography virus." I must have been fourteen years old and I discovered photography with a two-penny camera that had been given to me. Later, I equipped myself with a beautiful reflex camera and, in 1973, I made my very first slide show with the means available at the time: a slide projector, a cassette recorder and a homemade synchronizer.
Photography has always been a passion of mine and, although I am only a modest amateur, I still take great pleasure in discovering, at exhibitions, the works of the greatest, such as Henri Cartier-Bresson who has always been an incomparable master for me. A lover of beautiful compositions, graphic images and plays of color, I regularly attend painting exhibitions. Moreover, aren't painting and photography two very similar disciplines: many great photographers have also held the brush and the palette.
I am also a music lover and that is why I always pay particular attention to the soundtrack in an audiovisual production – I don't like the word "montage". One of my favorite composers is certainly Rachmaninov, but my tastes range from Lully (17the) to Brel, Bénabar or Souchon, passing through jazz and rock. On the other hand, I am also a history lover, the 19the century being my favorite period. I also had the pleasure of giving several conferences on various subjects as part of the activities of Triel, Mémoire & Histoire.
I am both honored and pleased to participate in the Coupe Lumière as a judge, and I thank its organizers for granting me this privilege. I will do my best and strive to carry out this function with complete impartiality.
Gérard Letessier
Curious by nature and a physicist by training, I have always appreciated the fact of being able to "record on film" the movements of life, but also to capture countless special moments. My many professional trips then helped me to develop my analytical and synthesis skills,
As early as the 70s I was printing my silver colour photos on Cibachrome paper and in the 80s I was already making my first video montages.
Much later, retirement came in the midst of the explosion of digital information processing; for photography and video, it was the rapid development of increasingly powerful tools, but the results, fortunately, remain dependent on the interpretation of the "director" and each subject treated is then the representation of his sensibilities.
Since then, my travels have become much more personal and often accompanied by specialists: ethnologists, ecologists, geologists or biologists...
Recently, I had to make a short film to promote a book about the history of the Earth and its state today. It was an opportunity to fully appreciate the difficulty of producing such an edit, but also the satisfaction of the result.
As a member of the Coupe Lumière jury, it is an opportunity for me to view a good number of quality audiovisual montages and, at the same time, to appreciate the expression of the authors, who participate in the various classifications of the works presented.
