Marseille: Day 2

Marseille: Day 2 — Jen Reimer & Max Stein

We spent the day at the Sound Development City headquarters at La Friche Belle de Mai today, exploring the complex and searching for locations for setting up our final presentation.

Taken from Wikipedia- “La Friche de la Belle de Mai or La Friche – in English The Fallow or The Wasteland – is a former tobacco factory near the Saint-Charles station in Marseille, in the neighborhood of Belle de Mai. In 1992, it was converted into a cultural complex. Presenting itself as a “pole of authors,” the Wasteland focuses its efforts primarily on the creation and production of works. It hosts dozens of international artists in residence [1] and it contains over sixty artistic and cultural structures of all disciplines (theater, dance, music, contemporary art, radio). It is also a place of spectacle and broadcasting, it contains 2 concert rooms (Le cabaret aléatoire, 900 places, and La cartonnerie, 1,200 places), it hosted several times the electronic and urban music festival Marsatac. La Friche includes as well a restaurant, a nursery, a playground for children, a library, a local food market, a skate shop, a skate park, family and community gardens and two new theaters. The Mediterranean Institute of Show Crafts will open there in 2014.”

I spent the remainder of the day walking along the Old Port of Marseille, where I caught Olivier Grossetête’s city made of cardboard, a series of cardboard buildings built by over 3000 people. I wasn’t aware that the event was taking place and so from afar, I actually thought the cardboard structures were real buildings. As I neared the buildings the cardboard and packing tape were revealed and many people were working together to build the structures. It was really such a great piece! You can see photos below.