In partnership with the Bibliothèque nationale du Luxembourg, we offer you a writing master class in French with Luxembourg writer Jean Portante on the theme of time.

         —     About the master class

In principle, every writer and poet is self-taught. This does not mean that writing a poem, like anything else, cannot be learned. It has its techniques which, while never replacing the desire or the need to express oneself, or the imagination, or a possible gift, enable you to enter into the depths of words and the hidden links between them.

The aim of this master class is to create the conditions for the unexpected to emerge in writing. To get inside words to make them say what they don’t want to say. To create an intimate dictionary, specific to each individual, enabling original weavings that will lead to the poetic text. Let’s not forget, by the way, that text and weave mean exactly the same thing, if we go back to the Latin source. Text is a fabric of words.

To weave, you need several threads which, when intertwined, create the fabric/text. This is where the writing techniques drawn from the baggage of the European and global avant-gardes come into play, as the dawn of the twentieth century saw writing make leaps and bounds. The master class will draw on the contributions of Lautréamont, the Dadaism of Tristan Tzara and Hugo Ball, the ready-made of Marcel Duchamp, the Futurism of Marinetti, the Surrealism of Breton and Dalí, the experiments of Kurt Schwitters and John Cage, and the Oulipians who, with Queneau and Pérec, opened up literature to mathematics and its constraints, to playful writing and its astonishing possibilities.

Each participant will be asked to write a number of poems that could be used in a performance-reading, and collected together to ensure that no trace of the experience is lost.

This master class can accommodate a maximum of 15 people. You will receive a confirmation email once your registration has been processed.

         —     About Jean Portante

Jean Portante is a writer, translator, editor, journalist and teacher at the Centre de Langues (now the Institut National des Langues).

Jean Portante was born in Differdange in 1950 to Italian parents. He has lived in Paris since 1983. His work, comprising some forty books – poetry, novels, essays and plays – is widely translated. In France, he is a member of the Académie Mallarmé; in Luxembourg, he is a member of the Institut Grand-Ducal. In 2003, he was awarded the Prix Mallarmé in France for his book L’Étrange langue. In 2011, he was awarded the Prix Batty Weber in Luxembourg for his body of work. His books are published mainly by Castor Astral (France) and Phi (Luxembourg), but also in some twenty other countries. He has been working as a literary translator for over thirty years.

      Explore the exhibition of photographs by Michel Medinger, winner of the Luxembourg Photography Award 2024. Two photographic series are showcased at Merl Park, providing a capivating glimpse into his artistic prowess.

         —     About the exhibition

At Merl Park, visitors can enjoy two of his photographic series: “Petrol Pumps” and “Sports Objects”, the latter reflecting Michel Medinger’s lifelong passion for sports; in his youth, he took part in the track and field competition at the Tokyo Olympic Games in 1964. This series is very topical in light of this summer’s Olympic and Paralympic Games in Paris.

Petrol Pumps

Abandoned petrol pumps, photographed in the 1980s and 1990s, are the focus of this photo series by Michel Medinger. Although these old petrol pumps are gradually disappearing, they can still occasionally be found in villages across Luxembourg and the Greater Region. Despite their outdated appearance, they blend into modern environments. With his keen eye, Michel Medinger captures this contrast in a way that feels harmonious, evoking a sense of nostalgia in viewers.

Sports Objects

The “Sports Objects” series, which comprises more recent work from the 2010s, showcases Michel Medinger’s dual passion for sports and photography. He emphasises the sculptural nature of the sports objects through strategic lighting, revealing their traces of wear and tear, and pinpointing the stories they hold. Many items he photographed belonged to professional athletes, such as Charly Gaul’s saddle and Josy Barthel’s track spikes. Just like in his series “Having fun” (“S’amuser”), these pieces show how much the artist enjoys playing with compositions and humanising the objects of his daily life, while at the same time making allusions to art history.

A second exhibition by Michel Medinger will be on show at the same time in the gardens of the Hospice Civil de Hamm in Luxembourg City.

         —     About Michel Medinger

Michel Medinger, the Luxembourg photographer, was born in Neudorf (Luxembourg City) in 1941. He is celebrated for his many photographic series, particularly his black and white still life series. As a self-taught photographer and avid collector of objects, he has experimented with a variety of photographic techniques, including black and white photography, cibachrome, and polaroids. By combining these techniques with his passion for painting – which was the first art form he fell in love with – Michel Medinger has developed a unique style of staging objects from his collection in the form of still lives, reminiscent of the curiosity cabinets from the 16th century.

The artist infuses his works with a subtle sense of humour; tackling themes such as the ephemeral, vanity, human fragility, and eroticism. He draws inspiration from the iconography of 17th-century Dutch Golden Age paintings, notably by Rembrandt van Rijn and Frans Hals.

Michel Medinger has exhibited his photographs all over the world, from Luxembourg, France, Denmark, Poland, and the United States to Japan and China.

From 1 July to 29 September 2024, a major exhibition dedicated to his oeuvre and curated by Sylvie Meunier is being put on by Lët’z Arles at the Chapelle de la Charité, as part of the famous “Rencontres de la photographie d’Arles” festival. A new book is being published to mark this occasion.

      Find out more about the 70th anniversary cultural events in this year of celebrations.

         —     The Cultural Agreement

On 8 February 1954, the Cultural Agreement between the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg and the French Republic was signed. This has led to a considerable development of cultural relations between Luxembourg and France, and has given rise to fruitful cooperation between the two countries’ cultural institutions in all areas (performing arts, art, audiovisual, heritage, etc.).

The signing of this agreement was commemorated at a reception held at the Residence of France, at the invitation of Claire Lignières-Counathe, the French Ambassador to Luxembourg, and in the presence of the Minister for Culture, Eric Thill.

         —     Cultural events calendar

This 70th anniversary is an opportunity to further strengthen the links between the two countries by promoting new forms of cooperation, focusing on young artists and creators, consolidating the very close cross-border relations and labelling a series of cultural events throughout 2024.