Frédéric Mitterand, French Culture Minister and Villa Medici Director, Dies at 76

Frédéric Mitterand, former French Minister of Culture and Communication (2009–2012) and director of the French Academy in Rome at Villa Medici (2008–2009), died on March 21, 2024, at age 76 after a battle with cancer. Born in Paris in 1947, he was the nephew of President François Mitterrand. He studied history and geography at the Institut d'études politiques (Sciences-Po) and taught economics, history, and geography in the late 1960s and early 1970s. From 1971 to 1986, he managed a chain of arthouse cinemas and worked as a film critic, director, and screenwriter. He was also a popular TV and radio host and a prolific author. As director of Villa Medici, he organized major exhibitions, including a retrospective of Gérard Garouste and a show of Ettore Scola's drawings, and created the villa's plaster cast gallery. Current director Sam Stourdzé praised his ambitious and generous vision. As minister, he promoted the Hadopi anti-piracy law and supported the Mucem in Marseille (laying the first stone in 2009, inaugurated 2013) and the Philharmonie de Paris auditorium. In 2005, his autobiography La Mauvaise vie sparked controversy for confessing to paying minors for sex in Thailand, a statement he later retracted.