III.5.9.xx TOMORROW'S DESTINATION?

MENU: 3.5.9.xx Tomorrow's destination?

A METRO STATION'S RENOVATION SUGGESTS THAT LA GOUTTE D'OR / BARBÈS MAY BECOME A HUB OF WORLD AND URBAN MUSIC 

Run-down and extremely crowded, the Château Rouge station had to be renovated...

Vito

In 2015-2017, it was.

The city's 302 other stations are spartan.

Though its tracks lead only to the North African and African neighborhood far from the center with no connecting lines,  luxurious hand-painted tiles compose the decor now.

Roots refer to the diversity of  residents' origins.

They come from the  Sèvres National Manufactory, which Louis XV founded in 1740...

     1817 / zoom

 ...and that Cameroon's Barthélémy Toguo hand-painted.

 Photo and article (in French) / zoom

 The National Library exhibited his work in 2024.

That decor combines royal culture and immigration in a way that is welcoming and prestigious. Is it directed to outsiders ?

# # #

Going the same way:

• Existing infrastructure.
• City-backed innovations.
• An spectacular new center for music.
• The population itself. 

In brief:

• Accessibility

• The Barbès métro station

• Another monument: A movie theater of the 1920's

• The washhouse that literature immortalized

• The couturiers' cooperative, now City-backed

• The Institute for the Cultures of Islam 

• World and urban culture for the planet?

• A portal toward the music of the outskirts

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Accessibility

ACCESSIBILITY

BARBÈS IS ALREADY A HUB TOWARD EUROPE AND PARIS AS A WHOLE

Gare du Nord (Northern Station): destinations London (by Eurostar), Amsterdam, Brussels, Cologne, Lille, Lyons (and Euro-Disney):

                    Adapted from a Google map 

Métro Barbès (officially Barbès-Rochechouart), point of intersection of the two main lines, north-south and east-ouest: 

Adapted from the official (RATP) map

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The Barbès métro station

THE BARBÈS MÉTRO STATION

THIS INDUSTRIAL MONUMENT OF THE EARLY 20TH CENTURY IS A NEIGHBOROOD SYMBOL...

A surprising site for exhibits and shows, and part of a passage waiting to be used.

Zoom

That also provides areas for exhibits and performances and a walkway waiting to be put to use:

• Paintings can hang from the ribbon of steel under the rails:

Les Intruses ("The Women Intruders"), by the photographer Randa Marufi for the Institute of Islamic Cultures, 2020 / zoom

• It overlooks a painted path that is adapted to skateboarding, bicycling, training,  performances and exhibits:  

The Compagnie Gaby Sourire and Faun Arts,

 

Installation by Ange et Dam

# # #

An "urban promenade" uniting the Barbès, La Chapelle and Stalingrad stops was planned in 2019...

    Map obtained through the link above

1.28 kilometers

But covid and a press that called it "the great waste, a "court of miracles, requisitioned by peddlers, delinquents and migrants," led to abandoning it.

 A court of miracles? The space in August 2022.

For how a similar passage 

is used elsewhere, please click.

 It waits for new imagination.

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Another monument: a movie house of the 1920's

ANOTHER MONUMENT: A MOVIE HOUSE OF THE 1920's

 

THE CITY BOUGHT AND RENOVATED THE LEGENDARY THEATER SLATED TO BECOME A WAREHOUSE

Le Grand Rex, next to métro Barbès, toward 1930 and now:

Zoom

The main gay discotheque of the 1980's was abandoned in 1988, almost sold to the Tati chain, restored by the City in 2013... 

  Zoom

 ...and now is a movie theater again.

For other images, please click.

 

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The washhouse that literature immortalized

THE WASH-HOUSE THAT LITERATURE IMMORTALIZED

WRITTEN ON THE FACADE: "MADAME MINISTER OF CULTURE, PROTECT THIS THEATER"  

For 20 years a developer tried to obtain the site where Zola set "The Drinking Den's" key scene. When the Socialists won the 2020 municipal elections, the City acquired it instead. 

The Lavoir Moderne Parisien

35 rue Leon 

The novel

Theater poster

Anonymous, 1877 / zoom

The key opening scene  

For the complete fight in Gervaise by René Clément with Maria Schell, 1956, please click.

After an epic combat the heroine joyously spanks her rival on her bare backside. She will take revenge...

# # #

The second floor is used for events. On the ground floor, a bar, a salon and a theater instead of a place a developer owns...

Bar and salon                                            A singer rehearses

Maya, a Voice, a musical in French and English: the story of writer Maya Angelou with Ursuline Kairson 

A characteristic program (end of March, 2023)

...because the City stepped in.

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The couturiers' cooperative, now City-backed

THE COUTURIERS' COOPERATIVE, NOW CITY-BACKED

GROWING OUT OF THE COMMUNITY OF AFRICAN TAILORS, IT BEGAN IN 2000. THE CITY HELPS SINCE 2012.

It produces prototypes and small series under the label La Fabrique de la Goute d'Or ("Made in La Goutte d'Or")  

Chaussettes orphelines

Its window can show French, Muslim and African cultures: 

Figure invented for Nuit Blanche ("All night," a City-sponsored event) in June 2023

Kitty Hartl, artistic director of the event, makes the figure in the cooperative's workshop.

"I'd seen this Yeti at an artistic event in Nantes, and furnished the model. I wanted 200 for Nuit Blanche. Finally there'll be 20 ... I'd first asked fashion schools for help but they did not answer or said it was impossible. Then I found this marvelous workshop. It was unhoped for.  

# # #

During the first lockdown the cooperative produced a million masks with filters, which the Mayor ordered when they were still rare:

# # #

Orders include the costumes for Opera productions: 

Fadel makes coats for a performance in 2020.

--"What was that show?" I asked him in 2022.

--"I don't remember." "I've made costumes for six productions since then."

# # #

"The cooperative is not for money alone, but to show that we are useful."

-- Fadel

A meeting

It shows the vitality

of production rooted in a neighborhood.

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The Institute for the Cultures of Islam

THE INSTITUTE FOR THE CULTURES OF ISLAM...

PRESENTS MUSLIM REACTIONS TO THE WORLD

Created in 2005 and opened in 2006, its two sites foreshadow ambitions that take wing a decade later. 

• At rue Leon

• At rue Stephenson

Their exhibits show how Muslim artists living in France view their cultures of origin. From March to July, 2022:

• At rue Léon: Persian miniature or modern portrait? And silences, taboos and the forbidden

The past idealized: Cyrus and the Odor of Lilies by Iran's Ryan Yasmineh 

 

Mounds of tangled threads around which one must tread carefully represent memories to which one must not refer : "Family Photos" by Oassila Arras, French of Algerian origin: 

• At rue Stephenson: Paintings evoke uprooting by linking a Syrian poet's verses to symbols of the sky.

Dialogues by Irak's Himat L. Ali

 

# # #

A place to appreciate North African cuisine

The Institute follows Islam's command for charity:

Please click back.

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World and urban music for the planet?

WORLD AND URBAN CULTURE FOR THE PLANET?

THE PARIS 360 MUSIC FACTORY FOCUSES ON URBAN AND WORLD MUSIC...

Web site

32 rue Myrha, at the crossroad mentioned above. 

.

It also proposes cultural events in all domains if they are excellent and principled. 

"A space for popular culture"

"Ethical Fashion Days"

During Paris Fashion Week in February 2022 it presented designers from the African diaspora and emphasized sustainable production.

Other events have included dance, stand-up comedy, workshops for children, performances by residents, readings... for a slammer reading the poetry of Aimé Cesaire, please click.

# # #

Bankers' replies to loan requests:

(In 2008)

• "We'll lend money for a six-story office building, but for a music center, it would be mad!"

-- Podcast, So Sweet Planet

• "We can't assure your security against those drugged-out hoodlums."

-- The police, same source

# # #

Yet a decade later Saïd Assadi, a refugee from the Khomeiny regime and organizer of trans-cultural concerts founded "Le 360" in La Goutte d'Or.

He had no experience of administration or of talking to bankers, but finally persuaded a bank specialized in ethical investments. Other banks and the City, which contributes 15%, followed. 

# # #

Pharaonic projects fail when the population rejects them, as happened to the 13th's Olympiades Towers. But Monsieur Assadi integrates the establishment into the neighborhood by a sidewalk terrace and a salon whose huge windows look out onto the street...

During the "Fete de la Musique," the night for music throughout the city

Neighbors watch the dancers in the background.

A bar and a restaurant whose excellent ethnic cuisine is made on the spot, at prices that are no higher than elsewhere.

Abou and a client.

Celeste and her child.

Meknet from Éthiopia and Raphael from Sénégal.

Free events like these...

An afternoon about Haitian music led by Charles Sadrac, a Haitian poet who lives nearby. 

A soirée by student engineers who install solar panels in a school of Burkina Faso.

Talk by Dominique Vidal, retired editor of the highly respected monthly Le Monde diplomatique and writer on the Israel-Palestinian conflict.

...take place in a lounge whose windows look out onto the street:

Attention to neighbors includes... 

• Monsieur Assadi attending the couturiers' meeting described above, where he spoke of openness to residents' projects and of his wish to collaborate with the area's couturiers.

• Evoking the Sapeur movement during the Ethical Fashion Days: A local shop brought it to Paris and it appeared in the street... 

 

The shop

In front of it, which unfortunately did not survive covid.

• Accessibility. One often sees Monsieur Assadi on the terrace, and meets with him easily.   

Residents' respect:

• A poster in a popular restaurant a few steps away.

• An irrefutable sign of approval: no cigarette butts in the plant containers.

# # #

Monsieur Assidi comes from a culture where illiterate taxi drivers recite 11th-century poetry, which is passed down orally. 

He says of modern Western culture, "You see yourself in the mirror, and realize you're getting fat from standardized food. But that you're also getting stupid from standardized culture doesn't show."

Promoting not-packaged arts 

is his contribution to France.

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A portal toward the music of the outskirts