PRESSE KIT For this 14th edition, the Croisements Festival is bringing its cutting- But above all, they reveal some amazingly talented artists. Among edge program to 35 cities across China. Once again, the festival will the ten French and Chinese illustrators proudly representing the be a celebration of artistic encounters between France and China, so-called “Ninth Art” this year are Jacques Ferrandez, Zeina Abi- in all disciplines and across all eras. The event is being supported rached, Pocket Chocolate, JuZhen and Luo Yin. by three Chinese celebrities whose fame is matched only by their talent: the actress Zhao Wei, the visual artist Xu Bing, and the musician and producer Gao Xiaosong. Female talents at the spotlight Heritage and avant-garde The Croisements Festival reflects an encouraging reality: women are increasingly present and visible in the artistic and cultural sphere. The visual arts will be represented by past and present artists Raphaëlle Delaunay Claire Levacher who have left their mark on the global history of art. Raphaëlle Delaunay is a dancer-choreographer, but above all From 15 June, the public will the able to discover the exhibition a chronicler of her time. She will present a ground-breaking Picasso: Birth of a Genius at the Ullens Center for Contemporary creation on 4 May at the Goethe Institute in Beijing, which Art. Originally designed by the curator Emilia Philippot for the she sums up as follows: “In a world that constantly seeks Musée Picasso-Paris, this exhibition-event focuses on the reassurance, I saw an opportunity for richness, eclecticism, young Picasso and his so-called “blue” and “pink” periods that formal variety and openness”. foreshadow a unique artistic destiny. To mark the 150th anniversary of Berlioz’s death, conductor Claire Another striking movement of the 20th century, the Supports Levacher will conduct the Beijing Symphony Orchestra for a one- / Surfaces collective has an exhibition devoted to it at the off tour highlighting the romantic genius of the French composer. Tsinghua University Art Museum – the first of its kind in China. This Clara 3000 group of artists, who came together in France in the mid-1960s, At the invitation of the Shanghai Dramatic Art Center, actress and revolutionized the visual arts through their new use of materials. director Claudia Stavisky, who is also director of the Les Célestins Their goal was to free pictorial art from the historical and cultural theatre in Lyons, will stage an adaptation of David Hare’s play, straitjacket of the canvas. Skylight. Featuring Chinese actors from the theatre troupe, the story involves a breath-taking face-to-face encounter between Pablo Picasso, Self-portrait / 毕加索，《自画像》 Paris, autumn 1906 / 巴黎， 1906年秋 two former lovers. Contemporary creation will also feature, with the Marcel Duchamp Oil on canvas / 布面油画 , 65 x 54 cm Musée national Picasso-Paris / 巴黎国立毕加索美术馆 Prize exhibition, Traveller, there is no path. Opening the festival at © Succession Picasso 2019 the Redbrick Museum in Beijing before moving to the Minsheng The DJ, actress and model Clara 3000 will open the festival with Museum in Shanghai, the exhibition will bring together a selection an incredible event, in collaboration with Silencio. Her surrealist of works by past nominees and winners of the prize. Created world located somewhere between dreams and reality, nightmares in 2000 at the initiative of the Association for the International and fantasies, makes her a worthy successor to David Lynch. Distribution of French Art (ADIAF) and the Pompidou Center, this In her mixes, she manages to create a dialogue between different Our prestigious, yearly prize rewards a contemporary artist residing in styles and influences, from rock to underground electro by way of France. film music and ‘80s and ‘90s pop. ambassadors Crossed influences Zhao Wei Zhao Wei is a Chinese actress, director, producer and singer. This year, once again, French and Chinese artists are pooling She is a graduate of the Beijing Film Academy. Following her their talents to bring innovative artistic projects to life. breakthrough role in the 1998 television series My Fair Prin- , she went on to become one of the most highly deco- The Ponzi Scheme, a play written and directed by David Lescot, cess tells the story of Charles Ponzi, an Italian immigrant to Boston rated Chinese actresses. In 2013, she directed her first film, responsible for a credit scam that led to the ruin of tens of So Young, to widespread critical acclaim. thousands of Americans in the 1920s. To revive this epic tale, which is not without its echoes in the modern news cycle, Lescot conceived a musical performance that is recreated here in Xu Bing Chinese with two great actresses: the famous Jiang Wenli (Charles Xu Bing is a Chinese contemporary artist who practices se- Ponzi) and the amazing singer Vivi Jiang (Rose Ponzi). A one-off veral disciplines and works with a range of different mate- tour is planned in 10 cities across China. rials, in particular engraving, ink painting, calligraphy, writing Le Système de Ponzi © D.R. and installations. His works are exhibited worldwide at major Same setting, same era for the opera Don Giovanni, which is revisited museums and art institutions. by the talented director Laurent Laffargue. Shown here for the first time in China, this mixed-cast re-interpretation of one of Mozart’s warmer and more graphic universe. most famous works has a Chinese orchestra in pride of place. The performance will close the Croisements festival in Guangzhou. Gao Xiaosong China, in turn, is taking on the French repertoire. The famous composer and conductor Tan Dun will lead the Lyons National Gao Xiaosong is chairman of the Alibaba Entertainment The director, dancer and choreographer Philippe Decouflé, who Orchestra as part of a one-off tour of six cities between Xi’an strategic committee, co-founder of the Alibaba Music Group famously led the opening and closing ceremonies of the Albertville and Beijing, including Dunhuang and Changsha. On the program and director of the Za Library (a public interest library) and the Olympics, tackles The Three-Body Problem – a Chinese science- is the Buddha Passion, the first Oriental Passion sung in Chinese Xiao library. He is also a music producer, songwriter, director, fiction classic that thrust author Liu Cixin onto the international and Sanskrit. The program is completed by Ravel’s timeless Boléro. talk show host and writer. stage. This drama, which shows the invasion of extra-terrestrials, doubles as a reflection on authority, freedom and revolt. In his Finally, the Bubbles Festival is returning in June for the fourth year adaptation, Philippe Decouflé wanted to move away from the in a row, more sparkling than ever! Comics and graphic novels often cold and distant science fiction aesthetic to recreate a feature incredibly rich worlds and astonishingly varied themes. Visual Arts Theatre Back to simple, radical gestures The Supports/Surfaces movement: within and around In the mid-1960s, a group of artists, mainly painters, decided to complete the deconstruction of the pictorial space that began at the beginning of the 20th century by doing away with its tra- ditional 500-year-old medium: the painting. The same logic was applied to sculpture and the authorized range of materials: the so-called “tyranny of the base”. The exhibition is focussed on artists who came together under the Supports/Surfaces banner between 1966-1975. The radicality, frugality and commitment of these artists, often united by friendship and geographic roots, are currently the subject of renewed international interest. BEIJING 21.05 - 20.08 Tsinghua University Art Museum TIANJIN 21.05 - 22.05 Tianjin Grand Theater WENZHOU 28.05 - 29.05 Your footsteps are the road, Wenzhou Grand Theater for there is no road Partage de Midi ©Jean-Louis Fernandez A selection of winners and nominees of the Marcel Duchamp Prize Break of noon by Paul Claudel, directed by Eric Vigner Curated by Annabelle Ténèze, director of FRAC Occitanie, this exhibi- tion brings together a selection of works by artists nominated for the Paul Claudel is the French author who has spent the longest amount of time in China: nearly fourteen years between July 1895 and Marcel Duchamp Prize, the common theme of which recalls a verse August 1909. These years were particularly stimulating in terms of literary creativity. They were also the source of the developing of by Spanish poet Antonio Machado: “Traveller, there is no path.” Since original poetics that would have a profound effect on all of Claudel’s future works. His play Break of Noon recalls his meeting with its creation in 2000, the Marcel Duchamp Prize has featured more Rosie Vetch on the boat to China, where he is due to take office as French Consul in Fou-Tcheou. Torn between his attraction to her than 70 distinguished artists. A product of the ambitious partnership and his religious vocation, he can only feel the pain of this impossible love. between the Association for the International Distribution of French Art (ADIAF) and the Pompidou Centre, the prize promotes and sup- ports contemporary art in France. SHANGHAI 03.05 - 04.05 Daning Theater BEIJING 27.04 - 23.06 SHANGHAI 06.09 - 20.10 Red Brick Art Museum Minsheng Art Museum TIANJIN 07.05 Tianjin Grand Theater BEIJING 10.05 - 12.05 Beijing Tianqiao Performing Arts Center XIAMEN 17.05 Cang Jiang Theater Mélancolie des dragons ©D.R. The Melancholy of Dragons by Philippe Quesne Seven Curtains, ©D.R. Claude Viallat, Peinture, 1966, ©Yves Bresson A group of hard rockers eat crisps in a parked Citroën AX – a raft set adrift in the middle of a snowy landscape. Everything is calm. A faulty ignition has brought time to a standstill.