LILLE, France, March 22 (UPI) -- Since its designation as one of 2004's two European Cities of Culture the French city of Lille has planned a non-stop arts festival.
There will be public displays, art exhibitions, and performance programs in locations in all parts of the city and its suburbs and in the outlying Flanders region.
Opening April 3 will be a new museum in the home of Gen. Charles de Gaulle, World War II French general and later president of the Republic, city officials announced last weekend.
Already in place is artist-designed pink lighting illuminating the Lille Flanders railroad station and flickering green neon lighting on the Lilleurope office tower.
The Rue Faidherbe, Lille's major avenue, has been transformed into a replica of Shanghai, and later in April an upside-down forest will be hung from a 35-foot metal frame over central Lille. The French sculptor Daniel Buren has designed a kinetic light show around the main square in Old Lille.
Other activities include cleaning of city monuments, sprucing up of the canal quarter, renovation of the Lille opera house, and conversion of abandoned spaces into performance and exhibition venues.
Summer art shows will be devoted to works by Peter Paul Rubens, Nicolas Poussin, and Jean-Antoine Watteau.
