Transnational Festivals, a European Alternative, Les Boréales and Reims Scènes d’Europe

At a time when concepts of European identity and integration are receiving increased critical comment, something to which Dragan Klaić devoted much of his attention, it is appropriate that research on festivals should examine and discuss the extent to which they are able to provide special opportunities for promoting knowledge, understanding and experience of Europe across borders and beyond. For those festivals that possess such qualities of ‘Europeanness’, such focused research should analyse those qualities and what can be learnt from studying the festivals that possess them. This chapter proposes to explore these important questions and themes through an examination of Les Boréales and the Reims Scènes d’Europe festivals. Analysis of the latter was undertaken in the context of the European Festival Research Project 1 , and of the former for a research project piloted by the Observatory for Cultural Policies in Grenoble for the Ministry for Culture and Communication of France 2 (Autissier and Deniau, 2013). This chapter is also the continuation of an investigation published in The Europe of Festivals (Autissier, 2008) 4 . This analysed the role of cross-border festivals and cross-border festival ‘twinning’ schemes. It highlighted in particular the pioneering role played by events such as Perspectives, a live performing arts festival based in Sarrebrück (Germany), which operates in close collaboration with cultural organisations in Forbach and Sarreguemines (France), and of the Mira! Festival, which takes place in the south of France and which introduces its audience to contemporary work from Spain and Portugal. Also analysed were the blossoming cross-border initiatives between France and Belgium. From reconciliation to a culture of cross-border sharing, I believe such initiatives aim to promote borders as meeting sites, as well as places for mutual discovery 5 (Autissier, 2008, pp73-87). For the purposes of this chapter, I will examine two festivals that take place in regional French capitals, and which aim to straddle European borders, criss-crossing the continent from north to south and east to west.