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2011 Nuit Blanche: Montmartre / Anvers (18e)

 
Image: Frances Dubois
Text: Susie Kahlich

Some very cool stuff is happening around Montmartre / Anvers, where everything is within a stone’s throw of a bar or café open all night to keep your whistle wet and your nuit, well, blanche:

For reasons I have yet to discover, Montmartre is home to frequent parades and Nuit Blanche is no different.  Nuit Blanche 2011 kicks off with Italian artist Marcello Maloberti and his troupe forming a human caravan, parading 70 porcelain tigers through the winding streets up to the Arènes de Montmartre off rue Chappe, where the tigers will be on display throughout the night. The official literature says this performance is somehow supposed to combine art and social utopia, which makes sense if your utopia includes socializing with porcelain jungle cats.

Not to be a big creep about it, but as someone without children it’s a treat to get a peek inside Paris’ elementary schools without worrying about being arrested.  At the École Élementaire Foyatier, Icelander Ragnar Kjartansson’s video installation “The End – Rocky Mountains” will be projected on five screens positioned around the gymnasium, while in the school courtyard artist Virgina Yassef’s mythological paleontology findings are on display.

At the Gymnase Ronsard, get a preview of art collective BGL’s installation “Entertainment + problems”, on exposition in October at the MAC / VAL.  Using recycled materials and found objects to evoke a huge bonfire, the piece is meant to “tickle the urban tribal instinct.”  Kind of like Burning Man, without the sand, hippies and actual flames.

Befitting an area rife with sex clubs, transvestites and hookers, Jesper Just's experimental film No Man Is An Island plays at Le Divan du Monde.  A meditation on masculinity, gender roles and societal masks set in a dying strip club, the film is centered around interpretations of Roy Orbison’s classic broken-heart song, “Crying.”

Montmartre's famous funicular will be transformed to a moving heartbeat in France Dubois’ installation “Extra-systole”.  Bathing the cab in pulsing red light that refer to a beating heart, watch the pulse slow down on the cab’s descent and speed up on the cab’s rise, just like your own heartbeat will be doing if you decide to walk the 200+ steps to the top.

At the top of the hill at Place Louise Michel, just in front of the very Catholic Sacre Coeur, artist Renaud Auguste-Dormeuil recreates his tribute to the 400^th anniversary of Galileo’s presentation of his telescope on Mount Gianicolo.  Using 500 candles, the installation maps out what the sky will look like 100 years in the future on 1 October 2111. And while you’re at the top, visit the Église St. Pierre and watch Adrian Paci’s 35mm film “Per Speculum” a beautiful and pastoral work depicting children playing with mirrors, slings and the reflection of sunlight.

More installations and performances are scattered around the Butte, but one of the most interesting is Belgian artist Filip Gilissen’s installation at the Église St. Jean de Montmartre just across from Place des Abbesses.  Titled “The Winner Takes It All”, the work will only be activated once during the night, when the 5000^th visitor triggers a golden explosion inside the beautiful Art Nouveau church.  Easily revisited in between verres du vin, check in repeatedly to try and catch the 5000^th visitor, or park yourself at one of the cafés across the Place and start counting. If you haven't had too much to drink, race across the Place and into the church as soon as you get to 4999.  Bonne Nuit!

 

20 Questions

Gregos is a Parisian urban artist who started out with graffiti and who now decorates the walls of Paris with painted moulds of his face, 'Les Humeurs de Gregos’. The artist has lived in Paris, Athens and Boston. He has now stuck over 300 faces in streets worldwide.

Interview by Rooksana Hossenally.

1.     What initially inspired you to move here or visit?

I am actually from the suburbs of Paris but I initially moved to the centre to be near family; but also because ‘Paris, c’est Paris!’ Paris is the most visited city in the world and there’s a dynamic urban art scene – Paris is like a mini version of New York for me! And, there are a lot of walls in Paris. I’ll go where my mood guides me!

2.     Earliest Paris memory?

Erm…it must have been around 1978 and we lived in the suburbs. I must have been about six years old and my parents took me to a cinema on the Champs Elysées. It was the first time that I saw the Champs and the Arc de Triomphe!

3.     Best neighbourhood you've ever lived in?

Montmartre – where else?

4.     What's the best meal you've eaten in Paris?

A crêpe complete – ham, egg, cheese and tuna – at this place on rue Montmartre near Grands Boulevards. So good! It’s the only place open till late and we always go there to get a crêpe while we wait for the first train back in the morning from a night out.

Dimanche Rouge: Sunday Afternoon Counter-Culture

Text & Image: Susie Kahlich

“Paris is no Berlin!” cry the twenty-somethings I know on a regular basis. “Where’s the alternative lifestyle? Where’s the counter-culture? Where’s the underground?” they demand. 

But to find the underground, you have to look under things, and sometimes behind things, and a little off to the side...

Behind the Pompidou Centre and a little off to the side of the Marais is exactly where you’ll find Chapon Rouge, an artists’ collective that opens its doors every third Sunday for Dimanche Rouge, an afternoon of international performance art, shared appetisers and drinks. Don’t be fooled by that description; it sounds a lot more high-falutin’ than it is.

Belleville Portes Ouvertes 2011

Image: Flickr CC cicilief
Text: Anna Bromwich

Behind the recent arrival of the first young galleries to Belleville is of course a creative richness that drives the dealers to open their doors. Belleville’s creative output can be measured by the scores of artists living and working in the hilltop quartier, many of whom will open their ateliers to the public this week for the annual Portes Ouvertes de Belleville. 

Organised by the association Ateliers d’Artistes de Belleville (AAB), the Portes Ouvertes is one of the oldest in Paris. This year the 250 or so participating artists will exhibit their work chez eux under the theme of The Virgin Forest.

In equating the contemporary art scene with a jungle, an unexplored territory in which nature is left to its own devices, Nicolas Dupeyron, director of AAB, emphasises the natural growth of the Belleville artists, fighting to make their work blossom and taking their professional visibility into their own hands.

20 Street Artists

Image: Flickr CC yoyolabellut

1. Roa
2. Bonom
3. M-City
4. C215
5. Coq à l'Âne
6. Rero
7. Matt W Moore (MWM)
8. BOMK
9. Horfe
10. JonOne
11. Grems
12. TomTom
13. Atlas
14. 1984 Crew
15. Zoo Project
16. Astro (ODV)
17. WXYZ
18. Teurk
19. Rizot
20. Trane

La Générale, In General

Text: Tristan Stansbury-Worthington
Image: La Generale

On the Avenue Parmentier, in a vast former electrical substation dating back to the early 20th century, people are playing ping-pong. The not so regular click-clack of the balls echoes high amid the great iron girders, mingling with the animated chatter of a rapidly growing crowd clustered around the bar. In the background -- music. Somewhere, an extremely talented guitarist and an equally gifted flautist are giving their expression free rein, their intricate strumming and soft warble describing a perfect play of harmonies. For the moment, they are obscured behind a great black curtain, from behind which a small boy suddenly emerges, intent on gaining the ping-pong tables, and hotly pursued by his mother who is more interested in getting him to eat something. Beyond the curtain, a silent few sit in thrall to the music. A tiny blond child is pushing a chair around. The musicians continue unperturbed. And when the ping-pong kid returns and decides it would be fun to run backwards and forwards in the spotlight and even throw out a few crazy shapes, there is no tutting or shaking of heads and everyone enjoys themselves all the more. Just another Vin du mois at La Générale.

It all began back in 2005 with an abandoned school in Belleville and a collective composed of creative militants passionate about turning an ideal into a reality: a creative and political laboratory, a space for free exchange where ideas could be given life. And somewhere to play ping-pong. Left-wing anarchist reactionaries? Maybe. There are rumours that the twice-monthly general meetings last four hours and resemble nothing so closely as a Soviet Party conference. Nonetheless, in the two and a half years of its existence, the first incarnation of La Générale would welcome over 5000 artists and associations looking for somewhere to create and showcase their work. Then the Mairie de Paris decided that they needed to do something useful with the space, so they threw out all the ping-pong players living in a dream world and built a mental hospital. With a ping-pong table.

The Gaîté Lyrique Swaps The 19th For The 21st Century

Text: Aidan Mac Guill
Images: Manuelle Gautrand

The Théâtre de la Gaîté Lyrique first opened in it's current location on the rue Papin in 1862. That incarnation was itself a reconstruction of the original Théâtre de la Gaîté, which had opened on the boulevard du Temple in 1808, but was destroyed in the construction of the boulevard Voltaire. That itself had been what would nowadays be termed a "rebranding" of the first theatre to be erected on that spot, the Théâtre des Grands-Danseurs du Roi, which first opened in 1792. Which, we can all agree, is a very long time ago.

Over the years the Gaîté played host to numerous premieres, from the first operettas of cellist Jacques Offenbach to the ballets russes of Serge Diaghilev, as well as productions by Willy Thunis, Patrice Chéreau and concerts by the tenor Luis Mariano. In 1974 the actress Silvia Monfort turned the Gaîté into Paris' first centre for street theatre. In 1989 it briefly became an ill-fated, science-themed amusement park, following which, bankrupt and in near-fatal disrepair, it lay dormant for 20 years.

Nuit Du Feu At Palais De Tokyo

Text: Jennifer Choi
Images: Olivier Robert

In Paris, whether you want to be fed, watered, culturally educated, entertained, or even simply sound asleep, there is almost always a trade off.

Great shows are pricey, decent yet affordable hotels are 20 minutes walk from the metro and just outside the Périphérique, restaurants where you can eat well without a second mortgage are booked up 'til next year and closed during weekends, and anything convenient is a tourist trap. It's a common rant, and if it's getting a little tiresome, it's because it's very often true.

But not always. This Saturday, there is an open invite to a night of fire breathing at the basin of Le Palais de Tokyo. It's the 7th anniversary of the first Saturday gathering organised by the Burn Crew Concept, back in 2004. Performers will ribbon dance, juggle flames and create fireworks amongst other pyrotechnic hijinks from 21h. Magical? You bet. And amazingly - the cost? Gratuit.
 
What's more, for this somewhat underground hobby that is mixing up and playing with heady chemicals, the organisers are very straight-laced when it comes to being good neighbours. Volunteers are recruited to clean up after every event and courtesy notices, dotted around forums and featuring alongside the event announcements, are never an after-thought. It might not be rock and roll, but it's what makes the Nights of Fire possible, Saturday after Saturday, year after year. Vive le feu!

Paris' Alternative Nightlife

Text: Rooksana Hossenally
Image: Hip House

Needless to say that Paris doesn’t quite have a bustling nightlife to rival London or New York, but it does have its fair share of quirky and traditional bars, restaurants and cabarets, as well as a number of alternative arty music events in venues all over the city. Popular with the capital’s ‘in’ crowd, venues like La Bellevilloise and La Maroquinerie in the 20th, Point Ephémère in the 10th, Glaz’Art in the 19th and Mains d’Oeuvres at Porte de Saint-Ouen are experiencing a rise in popularity, and it’s not hard to see why. The events held at these venues often combine art and music in quirky unusual spaces that have quickly become the place to be seen, especially for those of you dying to be part of the Paris Boho scene!

La Bellevilloise boasts a 2000m2 surface area divided up into five different spaces: the Loft and Forum, used for art exhibitions; La Halle aux Oliviers (The Olive Tree Hall), the venue’s restaurant, where art is also displayed and where concerts are held; the Club, which welcomes a range of bands from both ends of the spectrum and anywhere in between;  and the Screening Room, where films and video installations are projected. You could easily see anything from a Jazz sound system to a band of musicians dressed like Canadian gypsies banging out Irish folk music. 

 

Mois De La Photo - Off

Text: Aidan Mac Guill
Image: Mois De La Photo Off

Every two years in Paris the month of November is designated 'Mois De La Photo'. Of course in Paris it seems like everything eventually gets its own month, or week, or day. In fact I'm fairly sure October was 'Mois De La Everybody Gets The Flu', and this writer is considering launching a campaign to make December 'Mois De La Soul', a month-long celebration of the early nineties hip-hop pioneers.

Anyway, right now Paris is the world capital of photography, with exhibitions, discussions, workshops and parties being held by institutions like the Maison Européenne De La Photographie, the Jeu De Paume, the BNF and the Fondation Cartier, as well as countless galleries scattered across the city. It's a chance for photographers to exhibit, learn and network, and for the curious passer-by to enjoy extraordinary images from around the world.

Of course no self-respecting festival is complete without its strange, unsettling and often more interesting twin brother - the fringe. So running parallel to 'Mois De La Photo' is the 'Mois De La Photo - Off'.