Lille, and the surrounding area, is home to a diverse and eclectic cultural scene.  A number of world class galleries are celebrating the best of French and European art and this season will be displaying a range of masterpieces – from ancient medieval manuscripts to modern interpretations of life.  Lose yourself in a world of colour, explore the rich past of the region or marvel over the unique and emerging connections between art and the local community, and discover how Lille has transformed itself into a thriving cultural metropolis. 
 
Happy Birthday, Galerie Perrotin /25 ans
11 October - 12 January 2014
 
Continuing in its series of invitations to large collections (François Pinault Foundation,
Saatchi Gallery, CNAP), lille3000 has invited the Galerie Perrotin to take over the spaces of the Tripostal Gallery in Lille.  This exhibition will be an opportunity to take stock of the vision of a French gallery owner, Emmanuel Perrotin, through a selection of works by artists whom he has exhibited all through his 25-year career, works that for the most part are held in public or private collections.  The large open spaces of the Tripostal will accommodate more than one hundred works: sculptures and monumental installations by Wim Delvoye, Daniel Firman and Tatiana Trouvé, mobiles by Lionel Estève, ‘La Filature’ and ‘Vingt ans après’ by Sophie Calle, the famous ‘INRI’ by Maurizio
Cattelan and works specially designed for the venue by Gelitin, Guy Limone and Pieter Vermeersch.
 
Tel: +33 (0)3 28 52 3000
Website: www.lille3000.com
 
Illuminations
Trésors Enluminés des Musées de France
8 November 2013 – 10 February 2014
 
In partnership with INHA, Lille Museum of Fine Arts will present a hundred of the most remarkable manuscripts and illuminated pages conserved in the museums and learned societies of the Nord, Pas-de-Calais, Picardie and Champagne-Ardennes regions.  Art objects from the Middle Ages and Renaissance -from the collections of the Lille Fine Arts Museum – will be exhibited next to illuminated books and pages, in which medieval imagery and allegorical enchantment rub shoulders, as well as bronze sculptures from contemporary artist Jan Fabre.  A monumental mosaic installation of beetle-jewels, emblems, crosses and skulls specially created by Jan Fabre for the atrium of the museum will plunge visitors in a fabulous world.
 
Tel: +33 (0)3 30 06 78 00
Website: www.pba-lille.fr
 
Mahjoub - Ben Bella
La Couleur Incantatoire
18 October 2013 – 12 January 2014
 
The Musée de l’Hospice Comtesse brings together the luxuriance of the colour, the strength of the gesture and the diversity in motif and format - testimonies to Ben Bella’s full artistic maturity.  This exhibition dedicated to the artist, will, for the first time gather together his stunning paintings and water colours.  Featuring the last sixty paintings of the artist, the second part of the exhibition brings together his impression collection of drawings – whilst he is publicly known for his painting skills, which display a bold sense of action and diversity, few realise the technical mastery he possessed for drawing.  The one hundred separate works, kept in notebooks or drawn onto loose sheets of paper, prove his delicate sense of colour and style and the inspiration drawn from his Algerian origins.
 
Tel: +33 (0)3 28 36 84 00
Website: www.mairie-lille.fr
 
Bob- Erwin Wurm
Inauguration- 21 November 2013
 
The Centre for architecture and the city (MAV) and the SPL Euralille Development Agency commissioned an artwork to give a specific identity and new activity to Mitterrand
Square (in-between the two train stations and the city centre) so that passers-by might be able to experience it differently.  To achieve this, they turned to artconnexion, mediator for the New Patrons initiative, supported by the Fondation de France.  The chosen artist, Erwin Wurm, created a surprisingly humorous monumental sculpture that hosts a food truck.  The artconnexion, MAV and SPL Euralille invite you to the festive inauguration of this public artwork called Bob.
The New Patrons initiative set up by the Fondation de France allows citizens who are facing issues related to society or the development of a local area to bring in contemporary artists to answer their concerns in the shape of a commission.  Its originality is based on a new joint relationship involving three main players: the artist, the citizens initiating the commission, and the cultural mediator, approved by the Fondation de France, with the help and involvement of public and private partners brought together to sponsor the project.
 
Tel: +33 (0)3 20 19 68 68
Websites: www.nouveauxcommanditaires.eu
 www.fondationdefrance.org
 www.artconnexion.org
 
Daniel -Henry Kahnweiler - et ses peintres
28 September 2013 - 12 January 2014
 
Since it reopened the Musée LaM, located in Villeneuve d’Ascq has been paying tribute at regular intervals to collectors, gallery owners and art enthusiasts who have made museum collections what they are today through passion, patience, discretion and generosity.  To mark its thirtieth anniversary, the LaM is going back over the history of Galerie Louise Leiris through an exceptional exhibition.  This hugely eventful history is closely tied in with the modern art collection at the LaM, to which Roger Dutilleul and Jean Masurel were loyal for several decades.  Their selected series of works that constitute this collection reflect not only their personal tastes but also an almost constant aesthetic dialogue with the gallery owner, Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler.
 
Tel: +33 (0)3 20 19 68 68
Website: www.musee-lam.fr
 
Le Siècle d’or de la Peinture Danoise - Une Collection
12 October 2013 – 12 January 2014
 
Over the last 30 years, a vast collection of 19^th Century Danish art has been uncovered in France that, until know, was widely unknown outside of Denmark.  A French collector grew so passionate about this art (a style so unique it was called the Golden Age of Danish painting) that he collected over 200 paintings illustrating the whole century.  Such a collection has never before been gathered in one gallery – with works from such artists as Abilgaard, Eckersberg, Lundbye, Melbye, and Rorbye, the Musée La Piscine, in Roubaix, reunites them in a universe that feels both familiar and distant; with a discreet yet compelling charm. 
 
Tel: 33 (0)3 20 69 23 60
Website: www.roubaix-lapiscine.com
 
For more information on activities in and around Lille, contact the Lille Tourism board:
 
Tel: +33 (0)359 579 400
Website: www.lilletourism.com
Email: contact@lilletourism.com

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