“Madame Yvonne”, a traveling photographer, has crisscrossed the rural Trégor on her bike for over fifty years. From 1902 to 1952, she went to photograph on demand children, families, weddings, threshing, parties, communions, soldiers, the dead, the young and old. Born in 1878, Yvonne Kerdudo went up to Paris from the age of 15 to work. Through various encounters she came to photography and was trained by the Lumière brothers in the early years of the century. Returning to her birthplace around 1908, she settled on her own and worked until 1952, two years before his death in 1954. Emblematic figure of the canton, “Madame Yvonne” is known to all the old and her pictures are still exposed in the family dining rooms around Plouaret. In 2005, one of her grand-nieces, in possession of her archives, contacted us. The Compagnie Papier Théâtre acquired the photographic collection,consisting of 13,400 gelatin silver bromide glass plates stored over 50 years in the photographer’s attic. At least half of these plates include two views, so the fund represents more than 22,000 images. The plates have not undergone major alterations and constitute a real heritage and cultural treasure.It is noteworthy that no written trace accompanies this background. A group of volunteers was formed to do some cleaning, scanning, dating and identification work with the elders who knew the photographer and families with prints. To date, about 8,000 photographs have been identified. This immense work represents more than 4,000 hours a year of volunteer investment over the last 14 years. It brings a little more light every day on this exceptional collection and on the work of Yvonne Kerdudo, courageous and discreet artist of the campaign.

Pascale Laronze