Ten years before photography was publicly presented as a new technology, Le Château d’Eau started to filter and distribute drinkable water taken from the Garonne river through 90 public fountains of Toulouse. The iconic modernist tower was reconfigured as a photography gallery in 1974, becoming one of the first institutions worldwide devoted to photography. Images replaced water as the subject to be distributed to citizens. This exhibition explores how photography and water are being critically reevaluated and influenced by the environmental, economical, cultural and social crisis of the present times.
Water has been recognised as the origin of all life by mythology, economics and science. Religious rituals and scientific methodologies turn to liquid as a symbol of purity and an essential matter for the development of all things living. The ocean was the last known border of the colonial western countries; even today the deep-sea remains largely unexplored. In recent years, however, issues surrounding water and the sea have dramatically shifted. New generations grow up with polluted waters that threaten to overflow. Extractivist methods rob rivers, seas and oceans of their biodiversity and international waters are crossed daily by migrants risking their lives in the search of a better situation. Growing problems surrounding access to drinking water forced the recognition of water as a human right in 2010.