" Linda truly loves the culture. The culture needs to have people who are jouisseurs, art, music, cinema, literature, wine, cuisine make it vibrate. Linda, it vibrates ! "We had entrusted, in may last, in the midst of a pandemic, wanting to" wake everyone up ". While many national stages will remain closed until September, Christophe Girard, re-elected to his position of assistant to the Culture by Anne Hidalgo, will launch as early as July 18, his " month of August of the culture ", with 500 000 euros and corner-stone of the support Fund of € 15 million voted in the may 18. Readings of poems in the great mosque of Paris and the dancing on the square in front of Notre-Dame or in the long-term care facilities...
Nearly 1,000 projects were received after the launch of the call for projects, and some 170 sites in the city will be converted this summer into places for cultural events. The occasion for the Gentleman Culture of the city to show us some of these projects and the cultural policy that it intends to conduct in the capital, " who will not be that of bracelets VIP ", and evoke the turn-over of ministers rue de Valois, and the personality of the new minister, Roselyne Bachelot.
The Point : You have just been renewed at the head of the Paris culture, post you have already occupied from 2001 to 2012 and then from September 2018. What is it that explains your longevity compared to the turn-over of the ministry of Culture, for example ?
Christophe Girard : It is true that elected to the Paris culture, I have already known the 11 ministers of Culture, since 2001 ! In the country of the cultural exception, it is a problem, it is even a fault ! Compared, precisely, to what is the France, the whole world watches for the impact of its culture and its artists. I just believe that Anne Hidalgo considers that there are areas in which he needs experience and that the culture may not change their mind every year or every two years... It is the stability that we had under De Gaulle or Mitterrand or Jacques Chirac, and who has been forgotten under Nicolas Sarkozy, François Hollande and now Emmanuel Macron. The culture, as it is the history of France.
In matter, what do you think of the choice of Roselyne Bachelot, after Françoise Nyssen, and Franck Riester, in three years.
On a personal basis, I am delighted with this choice. Especially in front of the social crisis that is before us. It has the energy that it takes to win, for the trade-offs in particular, and it is a great freedom of tone, which do not dislike not to the artists. Linda truly loves the culture. This is a great music-lover and a hedonist, and the culture needs to have people who are jouisseurs, art, music, cinema, literature, wine, cuisine make it vibrate. Linda, it vibrates.
Not its predecessor ?
Well, of course, but in another way, Franck Riester is more measured, more modest. Furthermore, I supported it, but had to turn it all off, cancel everything, as radically ? In Paris, we preferred, while complying strictly with the sanitary rules, propose different scenarios. In Arles, Orange, Aix and even in Avignon, there were no solutions with smaller gauges, making use of the companies of artists in the region and on the territory ? In Paris, we have been able to save the festival "Paris summer" ; Franck Riester has been granted a year white for the seasonal workers, we asked, with Anne Hidalgo, but there are so many other artists and other disciplines who will suffer...
also Read the way of The cross of Franck Riester
You yourself have closed your museums, yet. And your theaters...
We have followed the safety instructions to the letter, but our duty was that they would be ready for the resumption of life.
You have adopted a plan of support for artists and cultural actors of the parisians affected by the pandemic in the amount of 15 million euros. With 500 000 euros for "a month of August of the culture" organized in the capital. That is what we will see during the "cultural summer" ?
A crowd of things ! Poetry readings at the great Mosque of Paris ; three shows in the arenas of Montmartre, The Bourgeois Gentilhomme of Molière, The green Bird by Carlo Gozzi, The Shakespeare's twelfth Night ; dance in the long-term care facilities and on the parvis of Notre-Dame ; a festival of short films and concerts in the 19th district... Throughout the summer, moreover, the meeting in paris dedicated to cinema heritage will offer cycles and retrospectives. A small selection to give an idea : a retrospective "Forbidden Hollywood" at the Luxor from 1 to 31 July, a cycle Lynch in the Champo, a retrospective of "A japanese" to the film library of the latin Quarter. But also a lot of other the Reflection Médicis, to the Schools Film Club and the Christine Cinema Club... throughout the summer, also in Paris, the libraries of the city will install in the parks, the gardens, the courtyard, on Paris Plages, and will propose a hundred animations, all of which are public, and about thirty of writing workshops. From late August to early September, worn by the Theatre of the city, in partnership with the Of Avignon, the Sacem and the SACD, we introduce a programming with a selection of authors and composers whose works and creations had to give a presentation in the Festival Off this summer, and who have not been able to do... We will have jazz, rap, concerts, a lot of places in the city will be put at contribution, in particular our schools, our museums, the Petit-Palais, the musée de la vie romantique... symbolic monuments such as the Eiffel tower or the Paris Mint, our cultural institutions such as le Centquatre, the Tile of the Temple, the Monfort, Theatre 14, the Paris-Villette, which will offer lots of new programs for audiences of all generations. We thought of all those who do not depart, or that are isolated, and we did everything for this to be stimulating.
also Read Christophe Girard : "Let a hundred flowers bloom ! "
What is it that we reproach the bobos ?
a Thousand and one delights ! But being hidden ?
Yes, it abides by the health strictly. And we invite the public to be, as they say, in " parade "... people are back to life after the amazement of the confinement, but I still feel a lot of melancholy and sad, if understandable... I'll jump sometimes in my sorrows related to the years of aids, the death of my two companions, shadowing and the loss of many friends... The great epidemics cause it, it is sounded, but we must remain vigilant, for a very long time... To the hospital, it is treatable, but there is also the need to read, to dream, and a book can brighten... To Paris, so we have a great responsibility. For the entire world, Paris is the capital of culture and artists.
But a culture is sometimes derided. "Made for the bobos ", some would say, or the homo festivus, according to the expression of the writer Philippe Muray...
What is it that we reproach the bobos ? They buy books, go to the cinema, they should be opening up new places where traditions are transmitted, confectioners, wine merchants, crafts pretty rare... As for the homo festivus, is it address to him when he offers to go and visit the permanent collections of the Carnavalet museum, which will reopen in early 2021, to go to see The Fairy power of Dufy at the Musée d'art moderne de la ville de Paris ? I don't know... Or it was the festive as I hear it : the festive culture, that may illuminate you from the inside, which opens you up to others. The culture, it is the most beautiful trap ever invented by humanity. It is the human condition. It seduces you, it changes you, of language, of universe, of the country, it sprays your prejudices. Every library, every museum, every theatre or concert hall is a place where one learns to be free, to feel, to build its critical spirit. Paris has the responsibility of 70 libraries, 14 museums, dozens of theatres, to places such as the Centquatre or the Gaîté lyrique, and we watch over them with love. It is committed to open libraries in the evenings and on Sundays ; the museum today together as the cathedrals, yesterday. I remind you that Paris is the only city in the world where students have art teachers in their schools. This backtracking will not be the culture of cocktails and bracelets VIP. And we will ensure that nobody is left at the edge of the path. The people of the shadows of the creation can count on us.
also Read Philippe Muray, prophet of our time
You are now descending ?
I did not become decreasing nor increasing, but the current crisis reinforces our responsibility. No question of having a "bar In" as cultural policy (in Avignon, editor's NOTE). We will make sure to go and seek out new audiences and take into account the hardness of the world today. Either we let our children consume up to be dumbed down, or we allow them to build their own critical sense, tastes, and dislikes, and find the patience to watch a table before you even shoot it...
