From Saturday, May 4th to Sunday, June 2nd, 2013, the Quai Branly Museum is setting up shop in Cergy-Pontoise and launching the “Nomadic Workshops,” open for free to the general public aged 6 and up.
This innovative approach to cultural democratization is the result of a genuine collaboration between the museum and the Cergy-Pontoise Agglomeration Community.
These “Nomadic Workshops” offer activities that prioritize interactivity: presentations of works from the museum’s collections by curators, art installations, conferences on anthropological themes, festive evenings, outdoor film screenings…
To make it easy for families to participate, the proposed activities are concentrated on Wednesday afternoons and Saturdays, as well as some evenings. On Saturday and Sunday mornings, the museum is also present at the agglomeration’s markets, where it notably offers storytelling animations.
Free shuttles are also available for residents of Cergy-Pontoise every Sunday, even beyond the event, to allow them to come and discover the museum in situ and thus establish lasting ties.
Activity Schedule:
- inauguration evening: themed around the mixing of cultures, this inaugural evening brings together local artists and national headliners, such as the rapper and singer Féfé, to build bridges between artistic creation and traditional cultures
- presentation of a work from the museum: the four continents represented in the museum’s collections are highlighted through the presentation of works from Africa, Asia, Oceania, and the Americas to the public by a lecturer. On this occasion, the works are leaving the museum’s collections for the first time
- workshops: practical activities intended for families on themes that vary according to the continent highlighted each week
- ethno-aperitifs: open-access conferences related to anthropological and ethnological themes studied by the Department of Research and Education of the Quai Branly Museum
- adventure of a work in the dark: tactile activity focusing on works using a facsimile of an object from the collections. It is adapted for visually impaired or blind people
- pangaea: ambulatory and sound installation dedicated to the discovery of the museum’s collection of instruments. Visitors are equipped with headphones and a transmitter to listen to selected sounds and excerpts from the museum’s musical archives as they move around. Their movements activate the sound sources based on their location and orientation
- mural painting workshop: activity led by Julien Malland, a muralist who has traveled the world. He draws his inspiration from the popular and ancestral traditions of non-Western cultures. For the occasion, the artist also painted a work on the fence of Cergy Préfecture
- creation of a planetary garden: a participatory event with the Coloco collective, which invites the residents of Cergy-Pontoise to discover plants native to the four continents and create a garden using them
- storytelling sessions: every Wednesday at the Museum of Education, stories from Quai Branly storytellers invite their audience to discover a new continent
- storytelling market: a storyteller and a lecturer from the museum visit the markets of the agglomeration’s cities on Saturday and Sunday mornings to offer storytelling
- trip to Timbuktu: actors invite the public on a journey to discover Timbuktu through the reading of manuscript texts, travelogues, and poems
- outdoor film screenings: a selection of short films focused on the Latin American continent, for the Latin American and Caribbean Day.
- electronic nap: a moment of relaxation in the park of the Maubuisson Abbey with electronic music in the background. DJs mix sounds and tracks from the four represented continents, sourced from the sound collection of the museum’s media library
- visits to the Quai Branly Museum: free shuttles are available to Cergy-Pontoise residents every Sunday afternoon to come and discover the museum’s collections
And for the entire duration of the event: the public will be able to discover a facility (Alain Mikli International sponsorship) presenting 2D and 3D reproductions of objects from the museum’s collections – presented in the Agglomeration Hall with free access. This system, which combines tactile and auditory approaches, is accessible to visually impaired members of the public.
