Matthias Vincenot is a poet, doctor of letters, Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres. He is President of the DécOUVRIR Festival and artistic director of Poésie en liberté. Latest collection published: A provisional eternity (Unicité ed., 2020).
Lately, we have lacked human warmth and reunion, bonds, what makes the best of our society and gives sweetness to existence.
We lacked concerts, exhibitions, theater, cinema, smiles and tears in more or less dark rooms, artistic shocks, emotions, dreams.
However, we have followed, as best we could, the side roads that culture has proposed, via new technologies, from a distance.
We read, too, and held the thread, as we could.
Today, even if the pandemic is not over, we can go out again, under certain conditions, but we have regained the freedom to cultivate ourselves.
Culture is not boring, as some may believe, it is all wealth and pleasure.
If it becomes pressure, obligation or convenience, it becomes perverted, it is exhausted, it is extinguished.
No one will recite poems while pole vaulting nor will recite Voltaire while shooting an archery.
However, let's take advantage of it.
Let us open all the doors to, in the incredible light that the Olympic Games represent, to allow culture to find a home, too.
Matthias vincenot
We need a great bath of culture, to swim there, to play there, to even wade there, to laugh and to love, and the opportunity can be given to us.
Indeed, France will host the Olympic Games in 2024, and this is not so common. Let us take advantage of this moment, which must be one of gathering and pleasure, to combine culture with sport. Because the best of sport, it is the surpassing of oneself but not the crushing of the other, the will of the ideal without the contempt of the failure, often temporary besides.
There is no question of mixing them up, no one will recite poems while jumping with a pole or recite Voltaire while shooting an archery.
In addition, I do not confuse culture and leisure and do not gulp-bulge this famous social link served in all sauces.
However, let's take advantage of it.
Let us open all the doors to, in the incredible light that the Olympic Games represent, to allow culture to find a home, too.
Popular culture is not a bad word until it becomes populist, and the elitism for all advocated by Jean Vilar remains one of the most beautiful goals in the world.
Read alsoJO: Paris 2024 at the foot of the immense Olympic challenge
Sport is already in the culture. In the movies, how many races on foot! The horse riding ? Westerns, peplums. Cycling ? “La bicyclette”, by Yves Montand (to a text by Pierre Barouh) has always been a standard since 1968. Viktor Lazlo sang “Canoë rose”, we are not far from kayaking. The jump ? There is no shortage of “comics”, the star being Spiderman. As for fencing, there are many classic heroes defending their honor. From the swords of the three Musketeers to the fists of Asterix and Obelix, we are not far from boxing. It would be possible to continue these examples in a smiling way, they indicate an obvious association, without necessarily being noticed.
At the start of the 20th century, Pierre de Coubertin even imagined a “muses pentathlon” to complete the Games of the time with a cultural component. Nothing absurd, therefore, in this idea which is not new. In what form should culture join sport on the occasion of the Olympic Games? In all possible forms, on and around the venues, in halls and via videos, in the streets and in the squares, in schools and gymnasiums, in towns and villages, and not just Olympic.
Many initiatives could be associated with this great event to come so that this summer 2024 is the occasion of a great breath of fresh air, reconciling those who do not like sport and those who fear culture, in a popular, demanding diversity that can quite simply make people happy.
Matthias vincenot
But who, then?
All !
Writers and filmmakers, sculptors and videographers, musicians and actors, painters and playwrights, professionals or amateurs, depending on the place and the formula, with educational establishments in the foreground, but not only.
By arousing, supporting and promoting heritage and novelty, seriousness and eccentricity, classic and unexpected, so that culture irrigates the life of the city, that it participates in a shared celebration.
Poetry in freedom is one example: each year, more than 4,000 young people aged 15 to 25 participate in this international poetry competition in the French language, and coming, depending on the year, from 50 to 70 countries. Its contribution would highlight in a considerable way the richness of what exists, of what is practiced, the talent of the creators, the multiplicity of associations.
And Paris of course, since it is the 2024 Paris Olympics, the eternal Paris, one of the cities most represented by art in all its forms, in the heart of which trials will take place, which is fortunate, Paris that the 'we will again be able to paint and sing, write and dream. Many initiatives could be associated with this great event to come so that this summer 2024 is the occasion of a great breath of fresh air, reconciling those who do not like sport and those who fear culture, in a popular, demanding diversity that can quite simply make people happy.
The French language would thus hold the rank of international language, delivering its creations to the meeting of the world.
Thus, with culture and sport, a huge window would be open on what unites beings and peoples.
In what form and with what funding?
Let the decision-makers decide, and the artists will be there.
