Category: centre-val-de-loire

Cérick Barray’s wicker installations bring plant forms into the Cistercian abbey of Noirlac, and light reshapes its architecture after dark. A Christmas concert puts voices at the centre in the abbey church, a storytelling performance follows, and two artists rework classic Christmas songs on bells. Parent-child workshops and a themed tour open the monument another way. An arts and crafts market and the abbey tea room round out the programme.

The Cher Departmental Archives have gone through their own holdings to trace how the photographic portrait changed. The sequence runs from the Sand family, sat for Nadar, to the work of Marcelle Vatan, a photographer based at Sancerre. Individuals, families and groups face the lens, and what they wore and stood beside tells how people of Berry lived. Bourges holds it, inside the Bicentennial of Photography and the Year of George Sand.

Astrid Jeanson, who looks after public programmes at the Musée George Sand et de la Vallée Noire, brings one question to Issoudun: was George Sand an environmentalist? The museum’s reading of that question runs through the forests, fields and rivers Sand observed, described and defended, and the peasant wisdom she set beside them. The word ecology did not exist in her century. The floor then passes to the audience and the invited guests.

Angélique Souriau-Villeger heads the Naturalist Studies division at Sologne Nature Environnement, and comes to Aubigny-sur-Nère to explain the Sologne moors. The talk sets out their landscapes, their vegetation and their part in the region’s biodiversity. It also follows these moors’ surprising connection to Scotland, which suits the town’s Auld Alliance centre. They count as a rare ecosystem, and the hour treats them as local natural heritage.

The Nahon links Vicq-sur-Nahon to Langé, and this Micro-Folie session follows the river into the history of the small country around it. Castles, villages, landscapes and heritage sites along it are read as the record of a berrichon territory. The talk reaches back to medieval origins, then to the great families and lordships that shaped who held power there. Much of that story stays little known even close by, and it is pitched for every age.

Jean-François Da Costa speaks on the motte castrale of Châtillon-sur-Indre and on the traces that time has cut into the land around it. His case is that such a site can be reimagined, reinterpreted and revitalized once heritage, landscape and memory are put in conversation. The lecture asks what still ties the present to what came before, and what a well-known monument of the town might yet become. Reservations are required to attend.

Alexander Calder’s connection with Bourges is the subject of this talk by Florent Allemand, heritage curator and head of collections for the town’s museums. It accompanies the exhibition Calder and Estève: Free Forms. The thread runs from the set design Calder made for La Provocation to Caliban, the monumental sculpture commissioned for the Maison de la Culture. The talk comes while Caliban is undergoing a major restoration campaign.

The Orchestre d’Harmonie de la région Centre brings together seventy professional musicians and musicians in professional training. Its concert draws part of its programme from George Sand’s novel Les Maîtres sonneurs. Through the sound of the wind orchestra, listeners encounter a musical portrait of the writer, exploring her imaginative worlds, loves and convictions.

AMI’s calligraphy workshop introduces the history and practice of handwritten Latin scripts. The models range from Onciale and Foundational to Chancelière and the monks’ gothic Textura. After examining the tools, participants trace letters before making their own cards, poems or stories. Materials are supplied, and each participant keeps the nibs used during the session.

The 11 Artisanes collective returns to Bourges with a pop-up exhibition of work by local women. Ceramics, leather goods and jewellery sit alongside stationery and wooden creations. Textile art, decorative objects and natural cosmetics broaden the selection. Visitors can meet the makers and browse their new pieces, with an opening reception also on the programme.