Patti Smith and Soundwalk Collective's 'Correspondences' Opens at Luma Arles

The multimedia project 'Correspondences' by Patti Smith and Soundwalk Collective has opened at Luma Arles in the south of France, running until 8 November. This is the first major European presentation of the evolving collaboration, which began in 2016. The exhibition occupies the 5,000 sq. m La Grande Halle, a former railway workshop built in 1894, now part of the Luma campus. It brings together all eight films created between 2023 and 2026, plus two new commissions, alongside Smith's drawings, photographs, handwritten texts, and archival installations. The site has historical resonance as part of the Alyscamps, a Roman necropolis. The films traverse Chernobyl, Greenland, the Black Sea, Siberia, and the Camargue wetland, invoking figures like Pier Paolo Pasolini, Medea, Alfred Wegener, Peter Kropotkin, and Andrei Rublev. Soundwalk Collective's founder Stephan Crasneanscki first records acoustic environments, then Smith responds with poetry, and only then are films made. New works include 'Children of Chernobyl' (2025) and 'Le Mistral' (2026). Smith produced new drawings and photographs on site, describing them as 'interpretations or expansions of ghost images.' The exhibition explores ecological crisis, memory, and the role of the artist.