The Jean-Luc Lagardère Foundation reveals its 30th cohort of grant winners

From left to right: (1st row) Anaïs Combeau (Bookseller grant), Pierre Leroy (co-managing partner of Lagardère SCA and managing director of the Jean-Luc Lagardère Foundation), Manon Picot (Bookseller grant), Marin Fouqué (Writer grant); (2nd row) Margaux Juvénal (Film Producer grant), Mathilde Bédouet (Animation Filmmaker grant); Pierre Vanneste (Photographer grant); Licia Meysenq (Print Journalist grant); Sabine Dabadie (Television Screenwriter grant), Léa Ducré (Digital Creator grant); (3rd row) Dhia Jerbi (Documentary Filmmaker grant), Louise Jallu (Musician – Jazz and Classical Music grant); Gabriel Renault and Antoine Talon for ATOEM (Musician – Contemporary Music grant). © Dahmane

Thirteen talented young designers awarded grants!

On Tuesday 28^th January at Paris’ Pompidou Centre, the Jean-Luc Lagardère Foundation held its 30th annual awards ceremony to present 11 grants to 13 young professionals who submitted ambitious, original projects in the following categories: Documentary Filmmaker, Animation Filmmaker, Digital Creator, Writer, Print Journalist, Bookseller, Musician (Jazz and Classical Music; Contemporary Music), Photographer, Film Producer and Television Screenwriter.

The grants, awarded since 1990, give young creatives under the age of 30 (or 35 for the Bookseller, Photographer and Television Screenwriter grants) both financial support and the time they need to bring their project to fruition, plus the opportunity to develop relationships with the people on the judging panels: members of the media and arts communities.

The amounts awarded through the grants (from €10,000 to €50,000) and the range of disciplines involved make the Jean-Luc Lagardère Foundation one of the top patrons of young creative talent in the French-speaking world.

2019 grant winners

Documentary Filmmaker Grant (€25,000)
Dhia Jerbi, 28
Project: make Des Espoirs [Hopes], a narrative documentary on the filmmaker’s quest to understand the roots of his stammer, to be shot in Tunisia.

Animation Filmmaker Grant (€30,000)
Mathilde Bédouet, 30
Project: make Été 1996 [Summer 1996], an animated short film made with 2D rotoscoping and colored pencils.

Digital Creator Grant (€25,000)
Léa Ducré, 29
Project: develop Eliza, an app in the form of a narrative work designed for personal assistants (connected speakers, smartphones).

Writer Grant (€25,000)
Marin Fouqué, 28
Project: obtain the time (and mental space) to write his second novel, G.A.V., a story that takes us inside a police station.

Print Journalist Grant (€10,000)
Licia Meysenq, 26
Project: investigate the underside of North Korea’s bid to attract tourism.

Bookseller Grant (€30,000)
Anaïs Combeau, 25, and Manon Picot, 31
Project: offer a wider range of books at Lilosimages, their bookstore in Angoulême, France, and make it a cultural force in the city.

Musician – Jazz and Classical Music Grant (€12,500)
Louise Jallu, 25
Project: produce a show and an album about Astor Piazzolla to mark the centenary of his birth in 2021.

Musician Grant – Contemporary Music (€12,500)
Gabriel Renault, 27, and Antoine Talon, 24, for ATOEM
Project: design their own instruments and record their first album.

Photographer Grant (€15,000)
Pierre Vanneste, 31
Project: “PO4, from fertilization to soil depletion,” a report on phosphate extraction and use.

Film Producer Grant (€50,000)
Margaux Juvénal, 30
Project: create a production company to produce Chevalier Noir [Dark Night], the first feature film from Italian-Iranian director Emad Aleebrahim Dehkordi.

Television Screenwriter Grant (€20,000)
Sabine Dabadie, 34
Project: write L’Orphelinat [The Orphanage], a thriller mini-series (six 52-minute episodes).

The Jean-Luc Lagardère Foundation grant winners are selected by prestigious judging panels headed by high-profile members of the media, arts and culture communities: Catherine Alvaresse (Documentary Filmmaker Jury), Jérôme Béglé (Writer Jury), Serge Bromberg (Animation Filmmaker Jury), Takis Candilis (Television Screenwriter Jury), Jean-Marie Colombani (Print Journalist Jury), Laurent Didailler (Musician – Contemporary Music Jury), Marion Hislen (Photographer Jury), Pierre Lescure (Film Producer Jury), Bruno Patino (Digital Creator Jury), Pascal Thuot (Bookseller Jury) and Zahia Ziouani (Musician – Jazz and Classical Music Jury).

The winners of this 3^0th round of grants are now part of a community of 307 talented young people who have received awards from the Jean-Luc Lagardère Foundation, many of them notching up some impressive achievements in 2019. They include:

• Christophe Barral (Film Producer winner, 2011): with his company, SRAB Films, he produced Les Misérables, released on 20 November 2019. Directed by Ladj Ly, the film has been met with great enthusiasm, seen by nearly two million cinema-goers so far, and won numerous awards in 2019, including the Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival, the Prix d’Ornano-Valenti at the Deauville American Film Festival and the Best First Feature Award at the Colcoa French Film Festival held in Los Angeles. The film will represent France in the International Feature Film category at the 92nd Academy Awards ceremony, to be held on 9 February 2020.
• Éric Baudelaire (Photographer winner, 2003): in 2019, he was awarded the Marcel Duchamp Prize – the most prestigious award in French contemporary art – for Tu peux prendre ton temps [You can take your time], an exhibition installation based on a feature film shot over a four-year period with students attending a school in Seine-Saint-Denis, France.
• Sabri Louatah (Writer winner, 2012): His four-volume work Les Sauvages [The Wild Ones], honored by the Foundation in 2012, was made into an original mini-series of six 52-minute episodes for Canal+, directed by Rebecca Zolotowski from a script by Louatah himself. Seen by more than 3.5 million people over a two-week span on MyCanal and Canal+ on demand, the series was a major hit.