...Design loves Bordeaux
Bordeaux, city of heritage, is also a city of design.
From the new Cité du Vin to the Pont Chaban Delmas to the quays on the Right Bank leading to Stalingrad, Bordeaux is a city undergoing a metamorphosis... a little further out, construction of the Arch of the MECA signals the birth of the future Euratlantique neighbourhood. Bordeaux, as always, is looking for a subtle balance between city and nature. This year sees the opening on June 25 of ‘Paysages’, a cultural program dedicated to the arts, and of course, there’s the biennial Agora, a celebration of architecture and urban planning, from September 15 - 25
‘Paysages’: thought in motion
This year, Bordeaux offers ‘Paysages’, from June 25 to October 25, an unprecedented cultural program in design, architecture and urbanism, with a multi-disciplinary approach that includes theatre, visual arts, photography, literature and debate. Bordeaux's cultural history shows a deep appreciation for the importance of its landscape, public spaces and architecture. Today it is a city in motion, proud of its history but resolutely contemporary, with an intuitive understanding of how design and landscape are integral to its destiny. 2017 marks a particularly momentous occasion for the city: on July 2, the superfast LGV train line opens between Paris and Bordeaux, reducing the travel time to 2h04. In honour of this occasion, Bordeaux is hosting an unprecedented cultural program called Paysages - or landscapes.
It can be agreed... that nothing is more appropriate than this cultural season, dedicated to the arrival of the high speed train,‘ said Alain Juppé, mayor of Bordeaux.
There will be over a hundred events, with many events having several venues and dates, for a remarkable and dynamic cultural season. Artists are drawn from Bordeaux, and from across France and the international field. It's impossible to list all of the events, but here are a couple of examples. José-manual Gonçalvès, head of Parisian art centre Centquatre, offers an exciting digital project at the newly renovated Gare St-jean that aims to establish a powerful dialogue with the landscape. Gonçalvès will place anthropomorphic sculptures ‘in places generally reserved, not for sculpture, but for people.‘ The idea, explained Gonçalvès, is to return to 'Leonardo da Vinci's idea according to which man is at the same time the central element and the measure of the landscape.'
Choreographer and dancer Hamid Ben Mahi brings Get Up, Get Up, eight days of an itinerant 'village', investing public spaces with a wide range of urban dances, performances, workshops, balls - simultaneously thoughtful and spontaneous, according to Ben Mahi. ‘To land in unexpected locations and gather every moment, every place, is to see the city differently, as an ensemble of landscapes in motion,‘ said Ben Mahi.
‘Lastly, quite simply, Agora is the illustration of Bordeaux's urban plan for the last twenty years‘