Student Entry - Emerging Talent Awards

Every year around six million pilgrims flock to Lourdes in the foothills of the Pyrenees. There they visit the grotto, bathe in holy water at the baths, attend mass and gather each evening for the candlelight procession. Stemming from a young peasant girl’s apparition of the Virgin Mary in 1858, Lourdes has become a major destination of Catholic tourism and pilgrimage. It’s easy have a cynical view of Lourdes with its crass commercialisation, endless rosaries and glow-in-the dark Virgin Mary’s, but beyond this lies an incredibly strong faith and a beautiful landscape where people come to retreat and find peace. Each person has their own story to tell and an individual reason for being there. Some come hoping to be cured by the ‘miraculous’ healing properties of the water, others are there to fulfil a lifelong ambition or duty to God. This project aims to tell the stories of those who go to Lourdes and to create a narrative between the people and the landscape, the light and dark and the spirituality that permeates the Sanctuary of ‘Our Lady of Lourdes.’