Wednesday May 16, 2012
If you're at all interested in photography, this is a must. Every year on the first weekend in June, a huge and very popular international photographic event takes over the small town of Bièvres, just south of Paris. This year over the weekend of Saturday and Sunday June 2nd and 3rd, professional and amateur photographers gather for a weekend of exhibitions and a second-hand photographic market on Sunday. And it's all completely free.
It gives everybody the chance to see professionals along with individual stands of amateurs. There are prizes for the best photos awarded by a selected jury to some of the 100 exhibitors.
It started in 1964, and quickly became a real draw. Today it offers a great chance to talk about photography, the latest trends, innovations and practices.
On Sunday over 300 traders gather from Europe, Japan and North America, buying and selling rare piece of equipment, collectors' items, vintage cameras, lens and accessories, vintage pictures and old books.
Practical Information
Photoclub de Paris-Val-de-Bievres
Bievres
Tel.: 00 33 (0)6 84 28 29 76
Website
Getting to Bievres
By train: Regular trains go from Gare d'Austerlitz to Bievres. Take the RER C direction Versailles. It's 14 stops from Gare d'Austerlitz.
By car: Bievres is around 10 miles south of Paris. Take the N118 and exit at Bievres.
More on Photography
Fondation Cartier Bresson in Paris
Best Instant Photos
Be photographed like a starSunday May 13, 2012
Every year the French join the rest of Europe to open their museums for a free evening. Called Nuit des Musees, most museums stay open from 6pm to midnight on Saturday May 19th and some particularly in Paris, to 1am. It's a wonderful chance to see many of France's great treasures for free. Many museums lay on special events, so there is a real party atmosphere.
In Calais, the Cite de la Dentelle (Lace Museum) brings in a company of professional comedians to entertain visitors. They'll act out the secret arrival of the forbidden, and therefore smuggled, lace-making machine from England to Calais; the sad occasion when the lace worker Serge was separated from his love, and how tulle can come alive in the hands of a master.
The Museum of Flanders in Cassel is putting on a show around the theme of Temptations, taking in figures from St Anthony and his demons to the powerful, proud Duke of Burgundy, Phillip the Good. Gluttony, envy, lust...all the temptations are there. It should be interesting.
And down in the south of France, check out the museums in and around Nice.
But wherever you are, check out the local museums. You'll have a very good evening.
Information and locations for Nuit des Musees
Museum Information
Museum Night in Paris
Nice Museum
Calais Lace Museum
Museum of Flancers in CasselThursday May 10, 2012
If you're in the south of France near Toulon, St. Tropez or Marseille, try to get to the 27th Hyeres Festival de Mode et de Photographie, an important annual event in the fashion and photographic world.
This year's Festival started in April with a competition to select winners from ten photographers and ten fashion designers exhibiting their works and putting their designs onto the catwalk.
Demonstrating its importance, the jury was led by Yohji Yamamoto and included Terry Jones, founder of I-D magazine in London and Olivier Saillard, director of Musee Galliera in Paris. It shows the strength of the fashion industry with big players sponsoring the event and the prizes. It's a pioneering competition giving young designers the chance to show their real inspirations without the market forces that so often stifle - or at least - temper pure talent.
For each competition, hundreds of hopefuls submit their photographs and designs; it's a formidable task to make the final selection that is on show at the current Festival.
The exhition, which includes the work of some of the great names in fashion as well as those selected for the festival, is held at the Villa Noailles --the landmark cubist villa built in the 1920's by Mallet-Stevens. The Villa is worth noting anyway for the changing landmark, exciting exhibitions that are held here throughout the year.
Practical Information
Villa Noailles
Montée Noailles
83400 Hyères
Tel.: 00 33 (0)4 98 08 01 98
Website
Admission free
Open Wed-Sun 1pm-6pm. Friday late night 3pm-8pm.
More on the Region
Guide to Marseille
Top Mediterranean Beaches
Guide to Provence
Friday May 4, 2012
This year's Cannes Film Festival, the most famous film festival in the world, runs from May 16th to 27nd, 2012. So roll out the red carpet, for this is the month when the world' eyes, well at least those in the movie business or the plain star-struck, are focused on glitzy, glamorous Cannes.
The stars arrive; the mega yachts sit in the harbor; everyone tries to get into the Carlton Hotel to rub shoulders with the great and the good and we all wait to see which film has been awarded the ultimate accolade by the jury, this year led by Nanni Moretti. Better known in Europe and Italy, Moretti's career began when he directed his first film, Io Sono un Autarchico (I am Self Sufficient) in 1976.
Hollywood has a good presence on the red carpet this year with such star-studded films as Walter Salles' On the Road, Lee Daniels' The Paperboy, David Cronenberg's Cosmopolis, Jeff Nichols' Mud and Andrew Dominik's Killing Them Softly, not to mention an out-of-competition screening of DreamWorks Animation's Madagascar 3.
The Brits are there as well, with English actor and director Tim Roth the president of the Un Certain Regard Jury, part of the Festival de Cannes Official Selection.
It's possible to see the stars - and some of the films - even if, like me, you are a mere mortal. See my guide to the 2012 Cannes Film Festival.
Also see my general guide to the Cannes Film Festival.
More information on Provence/Cote d'Azur
