We are honoured to unveil our new Honorary President for the 2023 edition of Parcours des mondes.

Who is Stéphane Martin?

Magistrate at the Cour des Comptes, Stéphane Martin worked for four years in Senegal and held various positions at the Ministry of Culture before chairing the musée du quai Branly - Jacques Chirac from December 1998 to January 2020.

"Since its creation by Rick Gadella and its "reinvention" by the late Pierre Moos, I have only missed one Parcours des Mondes, that of 2020, I had just spent two years in Japan.

Some twenty beginnings of September, strolling through the magical square of the "District" where collectors of all magnitudes, curators and the simply curious meet in an intense treasure hunt. Literally walking from one door to the other, waving at a friend’s face while already looking at the content of the gallery and glimpsing the desirable work: no fair, no show, no matter how prestigious and elegantly staged, gives as much pleasure as the few days of the Parcours des Mondes.

In recent years, I have tried to look at the works collected in Paris by the best dealers in the world with the demands and constraints of a museum manager that are not quite like those of a curator or those of a collector. The Parcours des Mondes is attached to some of the great acquisitions of the musée du quai Branly - Jacques Chirac and, at the same time, to many emotions experienced as a collector and an amateur.

For all these reasons, I am proud and touched to be the Honorary President of this 22nd edition, and I am looking forward to the emotions, necessarily new, that it will bring me."

Photo : Jiro Yonezawa