Cannes Cinema: A Visual History of the World's Greatest Film Festival, Photographs by Traverso, text by Serge Toubiana

These rarely seen images of the Cannes Film Festival are the work of the Traverso family, four generations of photographers who captured the transformation of a sleepy seaside town into an iconic location for cinematic legends.

The family's work was published mostly in the specialist film press, which is where many of these images were last seen. The Traversos' access was extraordinary and the intimacy of the works in this collection capture the festival's heady cocktail of showbiz glamour and bohemian beach life.

Pictured above is film star Brigitte Bardot from 1955.