VALLABRÈGUES Will the village win its place at the Festival d’Avignon?
A scene set up on the lake. The mayor of Vallabrègues, Jean-Marie Gilles, intends to seduce the Festival In d’Avignon team with this unique proposal.
Vallabrègues, new stage of the Festival A d’Avignon… And why not? In any case, this is the challenge that Jean-Marie Gilles has set himself. ” One of the issues for the village on which we have to work is tourism, especially in the summer“, he underlines. Thus, the mayor and his team dream of attracting some of the 106,700 festival-goers (the 2019 edition figure) to their land and offering them a setting other than the Popes’ Palace. This setting will be made up of greenery, but also of water since it is the most Provençal lake of the Gard villages. The mayor imagines a scene not installed on the banks, but on the body of water.
” We should bring the public from Avignon by boat, to our nautical stop. Then, he would walk to the lake, there are barely 200 meters to go. And people could eat at the Lou Vincen campsite, right next to or on the Cours Lafayette“, indicates the first Vallabreguant aedile. For professionals, the municipality would provide them with the Salle de la Calade which would be transformed for the occasion into a rehearsal space and/or dressing rooms.
Written in broad outline, this project will have to be further refined to respond to the various issues that cause it, and in particular those related to security. The municipal teams are working on it while waiting to be able to meet those of the Festival In d’Avignon. Vallabrègues at the 2023 edition in the viewfinder, it will be the premiere of the Portuguese director Tiago Rodrigues, who on September 1, 2022 will succeed Olivier Py at the direction of the festival.
If the In is quoted and not the Off, it is only for budgetary reasons. ” As was the case for Boulbon’s career, the financing and development of the stage on the lake would be the responsibility of the Festival In d’Avignonexplains Jean-Marie Gilles. I think the Off does not have the financial capacity to support such an installation. However, the mayor does not completely close the door to Off and could, in the event of failure with In, open the door to La Calade for artists’ residences.
Stephanie Marin