As part of La Semaine de la Francophonie 2010 in Toronto, the Alliance Française presents :

A Breton evening Discovering the great western Armorican

Performance by the Tiger-Labbé duo

Embark on the memorable voyage that is a Breton « fest-noz », where traditional dance and music, sung and performed on accordion, flute and percussion, conjure the festive atmosphere of these gatherings.To complete the cultural immersion, cider and home-made crêpes bretonnes will be served!

As part of the « 55 années de télé » series,

"Persians",
A tragedy by Eschyle
(French television archives)

A landmark production in the history of French television, this sumptuous adaptation of the classic Greek tragedy was staged by Jean Prat, and feature grandiose sets, gorgeous costumes, a musical score by Jean Prodromides, performed by the RTF chorus and orchestra.

Original broadcast: 31/10/1961
Duration: 68 minutes

As part of a symposium organized by Guelph University, Alliance Française welcomes the celebrated poet André Velter.

Sun always Sun
An evening of music and poetry

André Velter will read a selection of texts on the themes of travel, wandering, energy and the quest for space, as pianist and violinist Emilyn Stam will weave minimalist improvisations around the words of the poet, merging the musical language of Phil Glass, Arvo Part and Gavin Bryars with a distinct Indian influence.
Most of the texts will be taken from Midi à toutes les portes, (Gallimard 2007), although several new works will be featured.
André Velter’s poetics are devoted to the idea of revolt, of love in its wild state, to physical and mental jubilation. Deeply attached to the outward voice ("voix haute"), Velter works towards the emergence of a new form of spoken poetry, collaborating with musicians and actors to create broad polyphonic works. He was awarded the Prix Goncourt for poetry in 1996.

Guelph University’s symposium website: http://arts.uoguelph.ca/espaces2010/

To introduce a new series of literary evenings, « Toronto conversations », organised with French department of the University of Toronto students, the Alliance Française welcomes writer

Yvon Rivard

Yvon Rivard was born in Quebec’s Mauricie region in 1945. After completing his studies at McGill University and l’Université Paris-IV-La Sorbonne, he received in 1971 a doctorate in French literature from l’Université d’Aix-en-Provence. From 1971 to 1973, he taught at the University of Vermont, and later taught creative writing, as well as French and Quebec literature at McGill University until 2008.

Contributing to Liberté magazine from 1977 to 1995, Rivard was a regular literary commentator on Radio-Canada from 1978 to 1988, and was a guest university lecturer in Yaoundé, Bologna, Turin and Avignon.

Novelist, poet, essayist and screenwriter, Rivard has published over ten books, in addition to writing or co-writing three film scripts.

As part of its Classiques de poche series, Alliance Française is proud to present

Dans le sillage de Messiaen
With Adam Sherkin,
Taylor Strande and Tristan Durie

The gifted pianist and composer Adam Sherkin will partner with soprano Taylor Strande and flautist Tristan Durie for a concert retracing the steps of the seminal French composer Olivier Messiaen.
In addition to Messiaen, they will perform works by his disciples Pierre Boulez, Paul Méfano, Claude Vivier, Györgi Ligeti and Adam Sherkin himself.

Alliance Française and the AAOF are delighted to present

Texts, captions, and illuminations
(Textes, légendes et enluminures)
21 authors, 16 visual artists

This exhibition illustrates the many forms taken by the meeting of literature and painting. These works demonstrate the dual process of illustration: most often, a text is illustrated by a painting, though at times, the process is reversed.
This exphibition offers numerous pleasures: to admire a visual work, to discover a literary text, and to explore their relationship. The pleasure of discovery, when it comes to art, is a serious matter...

As part of the « Grandes conférences » series :

The origins of Earth, its atmosphere and oceans

By Bernard Marty

Our planet was born 4.5 billion years ago from collisions between bodies of variable sizes, in a hot part of the solar system close to the Sun. A final collision a few tens of millions of years later between the proto-Earth and a body the size of Mars formed two partially or totally molten bodies, the Earth and the Moon.
How did the Earth become a habitable planet? What is the origin of its atmosphere and the oceans?
Why did it not evolve towards inferno conditions such as those found on Venus, or into a frozen desert like Mars?
What impact could a better understanding of our solar system have on the protection of our planet or on the exploitation of new resources in the universe?

Professor at the Ecole nationale supérieure de Géologie and director of the Centre de Recherches Pétrographiques et Géochimiques [Research Center of Petrology and Geochemistry] in Nancy, France, Bernard Marty specializes in the cosmochemistry and geochemistry of volatile elements.

As part of « Arts de la Parole », the Alliance Française de Toronto welcomes a slam poet from Montreal

Ivy

For Ivy, the love of poetry came through music, as he explored the musicality and the lyrical exoticism of verse. After setting poems to music, he later focused on spoken poetry per se.

His studies and experiences convinced him of the power of the word. Along with his love of music, this led to the creations of a vibrant body of work that is influenced in equal measure by songs and spoken poetry.

With Jonathan “Jonas” Lafleur, Ivy co-founded the SLAMONTRÉAL collective, dedicated to the promotion of slam poetry. Poets Bertrand Laverdure and Catherine Cormier-Larose later joined them on this journey.

As part of its conference cycle, la Société d’Histoire de Toronto presents

« From experience to publication:
travelogue writing
in the 16th and 17th Centuries »

By Grégoire Holtz
Assistant teacher at the University of Toronto

Contrary to the common perception, travelogues are seldom the simple, factual accounts they claim to be. Indeed, in the 16th and 17th Centuries, the work of « ghost writers » not mentioned on the books’ title pages, signiificantly altered their content. At a key moment in the history of colonization, there was in many European countries a growing thirst for information on the lands to explore and conquer. This often resulted in the expansion – and tampering – of source documents. Is it possible to measure the gap between the travel account and its rewriting in the quiet of a library? How was the formal structuring of a travelogue founded on the collaboration between traveler and writer, and how much was the product of their rivalry? This conference will retrace the history of such accounts which, from first-hand experience to publication, adopted many cultural stereotypes and helped shape an entire era’s curiosity for the « otherness » of far away lands.

PHD in Humanities (2006), tenured professor (2000) and former student of the Ecole Normale Supérieure, Grégoire Holtz has been an assistant professor in the Department of French Studies of the University of Toronto since 2007. A specialist of travel literature from the 16th and 17th Centuries, he is interested in the relations between history, ethnology and literature.

As part of the Cinéfranco Festival 2010, the Alliance Française is proud to present, in association with Cinéfranco :

The skirt day
By Jean-Paul Lilienfeld

With Isabelle Adjani,
Denis Podalydès and Jackie Berroyer

A high school teacher loses it and ends up holding half of her class hostage, turning the situation into an reflexion on the crises of modern youth. Isabelle Adjani, looking stunning in her white skirt and blazer, is unpredictable and completely convincing as a teacher who detains the school thugs at gunpoint. A powerful and, sadly, still very relevant subject.

Originally released: March 2009
Duration: 88 minutes

As part of its Ciné-Jeudi cycle, the National Film Board presents :

Persepolis
Directed by Vincent Paronnaud and Marjane Satrapi

Winner, Jury Prize, 2007 Cannes Film Festival
The poignant story of a young girl in Iran during the Islamic Revolution, based on the award-winning graphic novel by Marjane Satrapi.
2007, France, 96 min

Preceded by
Conte de quartier
By Florence Miailhe

A crazy day in a neighbourhood under reconstruction: seven characters and a rag doll are swept up in a dizzying chain of events.
2006, ONF, 16 min

The NFB has a video library of over 5000 titles, which can be watched from its viewing booths.
http://www.onf-nfb.gc.ca/fra/mediatheque/stations-de-visionnement.php

Le Centre Francophone de Toronto, as part of La Semaine de la Francophonie, presents :

Richard Desjardins
et sa guétard

Armed with his guitar and his words, Québécois singer-songwriter Richard Desjardins is an irresistible force. Informed in equal parts by Woody Guthrie, Hank Williams, informed, Townes Van Zandt and Félix Leclerc, Desjardin’s performances are unforgettable in their honesty, grit and humour.

The Tiff cinematheque screens many movies in French.

This month’s screenings includes Chasseur d’images by Raymond Depardon.

For the complete schedule :
Click here

A joint initiative of the Italian Cultural Institute, the Alliance Francaise and the Goethe-Institut Toronto present :

The European Book Club
Claudio Magris' "Danube"

Moderation : Prof. Sandra Parmeniani, University of Guelph.
Landscapes, tempers, encounters, reflections, tales of a traveller who follows, with piety and humour, the old river to the Black Sea, tracing his own life and the seasons of contemporary culture, his faith and his anxieties. An itinerary between novel and essay that narrates culture as an existential experience and reconstructs as a mosaic the Central European civilizations through places seen and questioned, retracing their profile through their great History and the fleeting traces of everyday life.

http://www.goethe.de/ins/ca/tor/ver/en5578607v.htm