The Tobacco Files, soloshow of Laëtitia Badaut Hausmann, Franklin Azzi endowment fund

The Franklin Azzi Endowment Fund is thrilled to present The Tobacco Files, the solo show of the artist Laëtitia Badaut Haussmann, represented by Galerie Allen.

Franklin Azzi and his team welcome Laëtitia Badaut Haussmann for a residency at their architectural office as part of "Les MAGNETiques" program supported by the Direction des Affaires Culturelles Île-de-France, Paris Capitale Économique and Beaux Arts Consulting.

The Tobacco Files is an iconographic research project begun in 2022 during the artist's residency at the Secession in Vienna, on the tobacco industry in all its forms during the 20th and 21st centuries.

For this carte blanche, Laëtitia Badaut Haussmann continues to enrich this work, which so far comprises 8,000 images collected from a variety of sources, and assembled in binders. The almost obsessive process of collecting, without filtering or sorting, creates an anarchic whole in which tobacco is treated according to the evolution of its representations: from cinema to pro and then anti-tobacco campaigns, via advertisements in Playboy magazine and the exploitation of tobacco production. The subject becomes sensitive, even disturbing, highlighting mass marketing strategies and their grotesque and morbid sides.