67th Avignon Festival of performing arts kicks off on Friday evening

France's famous annual Avignon Festival of performing arts begins its 67th run on Friday evening.

© Christophe Raynaud de Lage

It's also the closing show for the two Festival directors, Vincent Baudriller and Hortense Archambault, who've been in charge for the past ten years.

Right from their first Avignon festival, Baudriller and Archambault introduced a different way of working, with a different associate artist each year.

Baudriller explained to RFI how this year's two associate artists, Stanislas Nordey and Dieudonné Nian-gouna have influenced the programme, with its more than 50 productions.

“Both are using the contemporary speaking theatre, they are very engaged in the society, and on the stage. They give importance to youth and transmission to young generation, this is the common point between them. But at the same time they look at the world and the theatre from a very different perspective. One comes from Congo, from Brazzaville, the other one comes from France. We try to have a different approach from previous years.”

Before the curtain rises, it’s possible to say this year's Festival will be marked by two things.

One is the presence of stage artists from Africa, from Nigeria to South Africa, from Côte d’Ivoire to Kinshasha and Brazzaville, with some European stage companies and directors working with African performers and companies.

Niangouna and Faustin Linyekula, with their previous appearances at the Festival, have been the pioneers of this new generation and are now lighting the way for new faces at the Festival.

RFI is partnering the Festival and presenting a series of readings (Ca va, ça va l’Afrique) in the Jardin of the Rue de Mons, by writers from sub-Saharan Africa, beginning with Niangouna’s 'Attitude Clando' which he performed for the first time at Avignon in 2007

The other landmark happening at the Festival this year is the opening of an important new building. It's called the Fabricca. It's a new artists' residence and rehearsal space just outside the Avignon city walls, just for the Festival.

Given the Festival’s co-production role, and the difficulty of preparing performances in the prestigious but vouminous mediaeval Pope’s Palace, Baudriller and Archambault were determined to build this space.

Long-awaited, the inauguration of this new cultural landmark for Avignon takes place on 5 July, with fireworks from Group F (who designed and organised the display for New Year 2000 at the Eiffel Tower in Paris). During the Festival the Fabricca will host, amongst other events, a 4-hour production by Krzysztof Warszawski, called Kabaret Warszawski, based on the play ‘I am a Camera’ by John van Druten and the film, ‘Shortbus’ by John Cameron Mitchell.