EuroPride 2013 logoSummer is always an exciting time for culture in Provence. Several key July festivals have been absorbed into the Capital of Culture calendar and the 2013 edition of EuroPride will be held in Marseille.

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Meanwhile many of the major shows launched in May and June, such as Le Grand Atelier du Midi, continue to shine and there are numerous open-air film screenings, concerts, feasts and picnics and other events throughout the month.

Click here to read our June diary for Marseille-Provence 2013 European Capital of Culture.

For the full programme (many, though by no means all, pages are now finally translated into English), see the website for Marseille-Provence 2013: European Capital of Culture.

Le Routard guide to MP2013Visitors to Marseille should also head for the new temporary Pavillon M on the place Villeneuve-Bargemon just off the Old Port, which is a primary source of information (the main Tourist Office at 11 la Canebière will be open as usual too).

If you read French, you might be interested in Le Routard Marseille, Provence 2013, capitale européenne de la culture, a very comprehensive book-length guide to what's going on.

1 July-22 September The Rencontres d'Arles, Arles' prestigious annual photography festival, has a black-and-white theme this year.

4-7 July The beautiful Caroline Hospital on the Frioul Islands off the coast of Marseille provides a sensational setting for the open-air MIMI Festival of avant-garde music, now in its 28th year.

The 2013 programme includes a series of pieces which reinterpret existing works of art: Franck Dimech riffs on a French television cartoon while Noël Akchoté plays Renaissance madrigals on an electric guitar.

MIMI Festival logo 2013Among the other guests in this highly eclectic line-up are Serge Kakudji, a Congolese countertenor with the Madrid Opera, and Rodolphe Burger, the former leader of the group Kat Onoma, who will sing the Song of Songs.

Package tickets are available which include the boat crossing to and from the islands as well as entry to the concerts.

4-27 July Aix's Festival of Lyric Art has a strong Mediterranean flavour in line with the theme of MP2013. Click here to read our guide to the Festival d'Aix

5 July-25 August a-part is a festival of cutting-edge modern art which takes each year throughout the summer in some of the loveliest countryside, towns and villages in the Alpilles. In 2013 a-part is curated by the writer Ariel Kyrou and the presiding theme is "reinventing nature through all our senses". Click here to read our guide to the a-part Festival of Contemporary Art.

10-20 July EuroPride, the major event for Europe's gay community, takes place in Marseille this year. Read more about EuroPride 2013

12 July Dance, poetry and music mingle in the Nuit Pastré, a magical night-time arts event at the Château Pastré, Marseille. 6pm-1am.

17-27 July The Five Continents Jazz Festival is held, as usual, at the Palais Longchamp, Marseille. The line-up this year includes Diana Krall, George Benson, Gilberto Gil, Hiromi and Wayne Shorter

The Chateau d'If Marseille18-19 July
The Count of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas' classic novel set in Marseille's Château d'If, pictured, has been filmed very many times.

But this 1929 silent version, directed by Henri Fescourt, is rarely screened. Here is a chance to see it with Marc-Olivier Dupin's original score performed live by the National Orchestra of the Ile de France. At the Théâtre Silvain, Marseille.

20 July-20 August La Roque d'Anthéron stages its important International Piano Festival at 15 venues in Provence.

All types of keyboard instrument are represented and guests include Evgeny Kissin, Nelson Freire, Mikhaïl Pletnev, Arcadi Volodos, Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Boris Berezovsky, Nikolaï Lugansky, Daniil Trifonov, Francesco Tristano, Lukas Geniusas, Andreï Korobeinikov, Anne Queffélec, Abdel Rahman El Bacha, Katia and Marielle Labèque, Marc-André Hamelin, Adam Laloum and the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, conducted by Daniel Barenboim. Website for the 33rd International Piano Festival of La Roque d'Anthéron

Festival of Martigues poster 201322-30 July The 2013 Festival of Martigues has a South African theme. Guests include Sidlangaloludzala, the Mahotella Queens and Sibongile Mbambo.

26 July-24 August The Roman amphitheatre of Arles is hosting Les Nuits de l'art équestre (Nights of Equestrian Art), nine evenings of horse-themed shows by the four most prestigious riding schools in Europe - and very possibly the world - from Saumur, Lisbon, Jerez and - the oldest and most famous of them all - Vienna.

The Jerez Riding SchoolThe programme begins on 26 and 27 July with Saumur, continues on 9-10 August with the Andalusian horses of Jerez, pictured, and on 16-17 August with the Portuguese equestrian school of Lisbon and reaches its climax on 22-24 August with the Spanish Riding School of Vienna.

As a bonus, the backdrops for their presentations are created by the fashion designer Christian Lacroix, who was himself born in Arles. Programme details for Les Nuits de l'art équestre

Ongoing Events

Until 1 September L'Ombre de l'Antique (The Shadow of Antiquity) explores the connections between the sculptor Auguste Rodin and classical Greek art.

Rodin never actually went to Greece, but collected some 2,500 original works or replicas from classical antiquity, and was profoundly influenced by them. Pictured: The Thinker by Rodin.

The Thinker by Auguste RodinThe exhibition gathers over 250 pieces by Greek sculptors and by Rodin himself in order to highlight these links and will travel on to the Musée Rodin in Paris in November. Website for the Musée Départementale Arles Antique.

Until 18 September At the Fondation Vasarely in Aix en Provence, a new exhibition, Vasarely, de l’œuvre peint à l’œuvre architecturé, assembles the op artist's work in a wide range of media throughout his life to trace the evolution of his vision.

Until 26 September Les Baux de Provence is hosting a slightly unusual spin on MP2013's ubiquitous theme of painters in the Mediterranean. Instead of a show exploring their fascination with the landscapes, its exhibition, Les Capitales Méditerranéennes "de Signac à Buffet", looks at how painters have portrayed southern cities from Toulon to Arles. At the Musée Yves Brayer.

Until 28 September Designed by the Italian architect Stefano Boeri, the futuristic and spectacular Villa Méditerranée (formerly - and more prosaically - known as the CeReM) hosts a show called 2031 en Méditerranée, nos futurs! (2031 in the Mediterranean, Our Futures!), which explores how we want the region to look in 20 years' time.

Also at the Villa Méditerranée is a permanent exhibition, Plus Loin que l'Horizon (Further than the Horizon), about movements of trade and tourism. Read our full guide to the Villa Méditerranée

Until 29 September The Digue du Large, a 7 km / 4.5 mile breakwater between Marseille's Old Port and L'Estaque, has long been inaccessible. Now it's open to the public again, allowing you to walk "over" the sea for the first time since 2001 and offering fresh views of the city from a surprising perspective.

As a bonus, the Franco-Algerian sculptor Kader Attia has created an installation, Les Terrasses (The Terraces), all along the breakwater: a series of bright white cubes and geometric shapes which you can climb on for yet more viewing points.

The Digue du Large is open at weekends and accessed by a free boat shuttle from the J4 Esplanade, near the MuCEM. Note that boats may be cancelled on days of high winds.

Until 29 September Aubagne hosts a pioneering  "travelling museum", the Centre Pompidou Mobile. Around 15 major works from the permanent collection of the Pompidou Centre in Paris are on display in a structure inspired by circus tents.

The show, entitled Cercles et Carrés (Circles and Squares), invites viewers to discover geometric shapes in 20th and 21st century art by painters including Duchamp, Kandinsky and Vasarely.

Until 30 September The Musée de la Légion étrangère (Museum of the Foreign Legion) in Aubagne hosts La Légion dans la peau (The Legion Under Their Skin), an intriguing-sounding display of photographs of legionnaires revealing their tattoos.
Musee Regards de Provence MarseilleUntil 6 October The Musée Regards de Provence, pictured, is the new home of the Fondation Regards de Provence, an organisation which stages excellent shows celebrating provençal art from all eras.

Its second show, Cassis, port de la peinture au tournant de la modernité (Cassis, Port of Art on the Cusp of Modernity), explores modernist art in the town of Cassis, which will also stage its own sister-exhibition at its Musée d'Arts and Traditions Populaires.

Concurrently the Musée Regards de Provence has an exhibition dedicated to the provençal sculptor Bernar Venet, who also has a giant installation on show in the gardens of the Palais du Pharo. The Venet show continues until 13 Oct.

Until 13 October Le Grand Atelier du Midi is a huge and ambitious exhibition in two venues in Marseille and Aix en Provence.

The title comes from a quote by Vincent van Gogh, who dreamed of creating a community artists working together in the light and colour of the South when he briefly shared a house in Arles with Paul Gauguin.

While other shows in the region throughout 2013 are touching on the same theme, this is the big one, with nearly 200 works by major artists including Renoir, van Gogh, Gauguin, Bonnard, Cézanne, Dufy, Matisse, Picasso, Dali and many more. They were created mainly between 1880 and 1960, though there is the odd later piece too.

The works are on loan from major museums around the world (the Musée d'Orsay, in particular, will have quite a few gaps on its walls this summer) and the main signage is in English and Spanish as well as French.

The aim is to explore how the South, mainly the South of France, but also Spain, Italy and North Africa, inspired these artists to develop Impressionism, Fauvism, Cubism and other revolutionary languages of modern art.

The Palais Longchamp MarseilleThe show at the newly reopened Musée des Beaux Arts at Marseille's Palais Longchamp, pictured, is themed around colour and the central figure of Vincent van Gogh, whose intense visions inspired the Expressionist, Pointillist and Fauvist movements, among others.

Meanwhile, over at the Musée Granet in Aix en Provence, Cézanne's exploration of form is shown to lead to Cubism and Surrealism.

A smaller ancilliary show at the Musée Ziem in Martigues looks at works by Raoul Dufy painted at locations on the Blue Coast between Martigues and L'Estaque.

Until 13 October The conceptual artist Bernar Venet, who was born in Château Arnoux in Haute Provence, was invited to install a very large-scale work in the Jardin du Pharo, a park overlooking the Old Port of Marseille and surrounding the Palais du Pharo, itself recently the subject of renovation. Venet's piece, called Désordre (Disorder) consists of a huge interlocking cluster of his trademark monumental arches.

Until 13 October Aubagne, a centre of terracotta in its own right, is hosting a major show celebrating Pablo Picasso's Mediterranean-themed ceramics.

After the Second World War until the end of his life, the artist experimented with this medium, employing themes with a Southern flavour: ancient myths, the sun, bullfighting, doves and olive trees and, as always, women.

Some 150 pieces are featured, many of them from private collections, principally the Picasso estate, and have never seen before on public display. Chapelle des Pénitents Noirs, Aubagne.

Until 15 October All around the spectacular landscapes of the Camargue, Arles and the Rhône delta, Les Grands Chemins d'Envies Rhônements is a series of contemporary art installations and hiking trails with - as the punning title of the event hints - an environmental theme.

Until 20 October A show of the artist Raoul Dufy's work at the Musée Ziem in Martigues is a complement to Le Grand Atelier du Midi in Marseille and Aix.

Until 20 October At Marseille's Museum of Contemporary Art, or [MAC], Le Pont (The Bridge) is an exhibition of work by artists from the Mediterranean region.

Promenoir à nuage (Walk with a Cloud) by Françoise Coutant, 2003Until 31 October An unusual concept is at the centre of a major show at the Musée Réattu in Arles, Nuage, or Cloud. The exhibition showcases exactly that: clouds in Eastern and Western art, both classic and contemporary.

It features Chinese pottery pillows in the shape of clouds, over 150 works by René Magritte, Salvador Dali, Man Ray, Andy Warhol, Anselm Kiefer, Cornelia Parker, and more.

Pictured: Promenoir à nuage (Walk with a Cloud) by Françoise Coutant, 2003. Website for the Musée Réattu, Arles

Until 5 January 2014 A new version of the hugely popular son et lumière show at the Quarries of Lights (formerly known as the Cathedral of Images) links into the overall Mediterranean theme of Marseille-Provence 2013 European Capital of Culture.

Called Monet, Renoir... Chagall. Voyages en Méditerranée (Voyages to the Mediterranean), it explores how the luminous colours of the Mediterranean, from the Spanish border to the Italian Riviera, have attracted painters throughout the 19th and 20th centuries.

 

 

Until January 2014 The MuCEM (Musée des civilisations de l'Europe et de la Méditerranée, or the Museum of European and Mediterranean Civilisations), Marseille's showpiece new museum, is now open with a permanent exhibition of artefacts from around the Mediterranean.

The MuCEM Marseille by nightThere are temporary shows too. The first two of these are Le Noir et le Bleu, un Rêve Méditérranean (The Black and the Blue, a Mediterranean Dream), which looks at artists' visions of the future across countries and centuries and the curiously named Le Bazar du Genre (The Gender Bazaar), which investigates traditional concepts of gender and sexuality in different Mediterranean cultures.

Pictured, the building itself, designed by Rudy Ricciotti, is well worth a visit, as are the landscaped gardens in the adjacent Fort Saint Jean.

Click here to read our August diary for Marseille-Provence 2013 European Capital of Culture.

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