Dorothea Lange (1895-1965) was a famous American photographer who documented an America devastated by the unprecedented economic crisis and lax government of the 1930s. Following the Great Depression in the United States and his recent election, Franklin Roosevelt launched the New Deal programme to help landowners. For it was they who suffered most from this crisis, both economic and ecological. Not only did the stock market crash of 1929 hit them hard, but sandstorms ravaged poorly protected farmland. Poverty was compounded by famine and massive population displacement, particularly to Canada. To alleviate this double crisis, Franklin Roosevelt distributed aid to landowners with the Farm Security Act. He also authorised the expansion of agricultural crops during their reconstruction. In order to justify this New Deal policy, Roosevelt and the Farm Security Act wanted to show the consequences of the crisis on the American population through photographs. Dorothea Lange was one of the official photographers of the Farm Security Act. Her pictures of vernacular architecture and portraits of farmers are extremely powerful. With her husband Paul Taylor, they toured the United States visiting unemployed farmers, gatherers and agriculturists of all kinds. This exhibition is made possible by the generous donation of Sam Stourdzé. Sam Stourdzé was the curator of the 1998 exhibition on Dorothea Lange at the Hôtel Sully in Paris, for which he had 36 silver prints made from negatives held by the Oakland Museum of California. He was also the director of the Rencontres de la Photographie d'Arles. It is therefore only natural that this exhibition should take place in the Provençal city that is so close to his heart.