Julien Gignac, Centretown News
Photos of various games, not unlike those played at board game café Monopolatte, are part of an exhibit at Alliance Française.The Centretown-based Alliance Française of Ottawa has launched a new photography exhibition at its MacLaren Street gallery space.
This year’s theme for the exhibit is On joue sur la Terre. It features the work of amateur photographers from around the world as they depict people from a variety of cultures playing games or activities – including chess in the Netherlands and India and flying kites in Malaysia.
The images explore the social significance of these pastimes.
“It creates some sort of cultural movement,” says Komlanvi Dodjro, the alliance’s cultural event coordinator. “Having different people from all walks of life create a piece of artwork like this.”
The Alliance Françaises are independent non-profit organizations that promote the francophone culture and act as schools, teaching its students the French language.
The exhibition is the result of an international photo contest organized by La Fondation Alliance Française in partnership with Courrier International magazine.
La Fondation aims to develop the French language globally through the 800 Alliance Françaises it supports. The contest organizers receive photos submitted by photographers of the general public from all the organizations globally.
The annual exhibit is an opportunity for amateur photographers to show their work around the world and to display the rich and diverse culture of all the 800 organizations’ countries.
This year, the exhibit displays 45 of the best photographs and the first prize went to Omar Jimenez Gonzalez from Guadalajara, Mexico.
Gonzalez depicted a young boy in a muddy field with balloons and a sign that read, “Imagina que.” The underlying message was that this Mexican boy did not have a game to play and is left to use his imagination.
Another one of the top photographers, Manjit Singh Honjan, depicted games being played in India such as chess and carrom, which is similar to shuffleboard.
This years exhibit’s photos depict pastimes that are not too different from the kinds of board games played by patrons at Centretown’s Monopolatte café.
“When you play an indie board game, or a classic like Monopoly, you’re sort of reaching back into that cultural past of board gaming,” says employee A.J. Comeau.
Out of the nine Alliance Française organizations in Canada, the Ottawa and Halifax locations are the only two to participate in displaying this exhibit.
The exhibit runs until Feb. 26 at 352 MacLaren St.