Sir Simon Rattle conducting the Rheingold in 2006
Music
Aix holds two significant musical events each year. These are:
Festival d'Aix-en-Provence
An important opera festival, the Festival international d'Art Lyrique, founded in 1948, now ranks with those in Bayreuth, Salzburg and Glyndebourne. The current director is Bernard Foccroulle, director of la Monnaie in Brussels. The festival takes place in late June and July each year. The main venues in Aix itself are the outdoor Théâtre de l'Archévêché in the former garden of the archbishop's palace, the recently restored 18th-century Théâtre du Jeu de Paume, and the newly built Grand Théâtre de Provence; operas are also staged in the outdoor Théâtre du Grand Saint-Jean outside Aix. Linked to the festival is the Académie européenne de musique, a summer school for young musicians with master classes by celebrated artists. Over the four-year period from 2006 until 2009, Sir Simon Rattle's version of Wagner's Ring Cycle with the Berlin Philharmonic is being premiered at the Aix festival.
Musique dans la Rue
This takes place each year in June to coincide with the national 'Fête de la Musique.' There is a week of classical, jazz and popular concerts held in different street venues and courtyards in the city. Some of these events are held in the Conservatoire Darius Milhaud, named in honour of the French composer, a native of Aix.
Dance
The dance company Ballet Preljocaj of the French dancer and choreographer Angelin Preljocaj has been located in Aix since 1996. In 2007 it took up residence in the "Pavillon Noir", a centre for dance performance, designed in 1999 by the architect Rudy Ricciotti. The centre is one of nineteen of its kind in France, designated Centre chorégraphique national.
Museums and Libraries
Granet's "Pumpkin Harvest" at the Musée Granet
Aix has several museums and galleries:
Le Musée du Vieil Aix (Museum of Old Aix), housed in two period "hôtels particuliers" and devoted to the history and provencal heritage of Aix.
Le Muséum d’Histoire Naturelle (Natural History Museum).
Le Musée de Tapisseries (Tapestry Museum), housed in the Archbishop's Palace and with a collection of tapestries and furniture from the 17th and 18th centuries.
Le Musée Paul Arbaud (Faïence/Pottery).
Le Musée Granet, a museum devoted to painting, sculpture and the archeology of Aix. It recently underwent significant restoration and reorganization, prior to the international exhibition in 2006 marking the centenary of Cézanne's death. Due to lack of space, the large archeological collection, including many recent discoveries, will be displayed in a new museum, still in the planning stages. The museum contains major paintings by Jean-Dominique Ingres (among which the monumental "Jupiter and Thetis"), an authentic self-portrait by Rembrandt and works by Anthony van Dyck, Paul Cézanne, Alberto Giacometti and Nicolas de Staël. In June 2011, the first part of the collection of the Fondation Jean et Suzanne Planque opened at the Musée Granet, containing over 180 artworks. This legacy of the Swiss painter, dealer and art collector Jean Planque, a personal friend of Pablo Picasso, has been donated to the city for an initial period of 15 years. The collection contains over 300 works of art, including paintings and drawings by Degas, Renoir. Gauguin, Monet, Cézanne, Van Gogh, Picasso, Pierre Bonnard, Paul Klee, Fernand Léger, Giacometti and Dubuffet. The full collection will be housed in a specially constructed annex in the Chapelle des Pénitents Blancs, situated nearby: the expected opening is in 2013.
the Vendôme Pavilion in Aix-en-Provence
Le Pavillon de Vendôme, a 17th-century mansion housing permanent and touring art exhibitions.
The Vasarely Foundation a gallery dedicated to the works of the Hungarian-born French abstract painter Victor Vasarely.
L'atelier Cézanne, a museum on the northern outskirts of Aix, constructed around the studio of Paul Cézanne, which can be viewed as it was at the painter's death.
Jas de Bouffan, the house and grounds of Cézanne's father, now partially open to the public.
Prior to 1989 Aix had several libraries, for example in the Parc Jourdan and the Town Hall. In 1989, many of these were moved to the Méjanes, an old match factory.
In 1993, the "Cité du Livre" was opened around the library. This has media spaces for dance, cinema and music, and a training facility for librarians. Adjacent to the Cité du Livre are the Grand Théâtre de Provence and the Pavillon Noir (see above).
Montagne Sainte-Victoire
Mont Sainte-Victoire, Paul Cézanne 1882-5
Mont Sainte-Victoire, Paul Cézanne 1904-6
To the east of Aix rises the Montagne Sainte-Victoire (1011 m), one of the landmarks of the Pays d'Aix. It is accessible from the centre of Aix by road or on foot, taking the wooded footpath of Escrachou Pevou to the plateau of Bibemus. It dramatically overshadows the small dam built by Emile Zola's father and was a favourite subject and haunt of Paul Cézanne throughout his lifetime. In the village of le Tholonet on the precipitous southern side of Mont Sainte-Victoire, there is a windmill that he used and beyond that a mountain hut, the refuge Cézanne, where he liked to paint.
To the north, the mountain slopes gently down through woodland to the village of Vauvenargues. The Château of Vauvenargues overlooking the village was formerly occupied the by the Counts of Provence (including René of Anjou) and the Archbishops of Aix before it became the family home of the marquis de Vauvenargues. It was acquired by the Spanish artist Pablo Picasso in 1958, who was resident there from 1959 until 1962, when he moved to Mougins. He and his wife wife Jacqueline are buried in its grounds, which are not usually open to the public. From 2009 onwards, the chateau, which now belongs to Jacqueline's daughter Catherine Hutin, has been open to the public from June to September.
Mont Sainte-Victoire has a complex network of paths, leading to the priory and Croix de Provence at the summit, to the large man-made reservoir of Bimont and to the roman viaduct above le Tholonet.
