MeTaMap web application is proposing a digital map where every registered person can geolocalise multimedia contributions in order to deliver his or her perception of the area. Users can then take a tour across this map, visit and experience a city through the eyes and ears of other people.

The second “Rendez-vous with French cinema”, showcasing the best of contemporary cinema, never seen before in India, will be presented by Unifrance, the agency promoting French cinema abroad. Celebrity actors, directors and producers will interact with India’s film industry.

The festival will also showcase legendary films including major masterpieces from the “New Wave” cinema in association with the Cinémathèque Française”.
Read More

Set mainly in Paris, this is the story of Sadhavi, a married woman, who finds herself intensely attracted to Kanav, whom she meets in Paris. An intelligent woman with a traditional upbringing, she finds herself somewhat alone and emotionally vulnerable.

Priti Aisola was a student of English Literature at the Central University of Hyderabad. She is the wife of an Indian diplomat who, as a result, has traveled extensively. She has lived in France, the Ivory Coast, Syria and Hungary.
Read More

The book ‘Mots transparent’ is a documentation of shared vocabulary between the French and English language. From Architecture to Wagon, English speakers already know thousands of French words; this is celebrated on the occasion of the Bonjour India festival ! With the technical support of E-Nova, an internet version of the book will also be launched. A national quiz competition will award the winners with scholarships to study French in one of the Alliances Françaises, the Indo-French cultural centres for learning the French language.

Awek’s music is inspired by the classics; it finds its vibrant energy in Gospel music. With 6 albums and 13 years of experience behind them, the four Awek musicians have acquired a strength and maturity worthy of their peers on the other side of the Atlantic. Their blues charmed Memphis audiences during the International Blues Challenge in February 2008. Awek was elected band of the year at the Cognac Blues Passions festival.

An MTV host, singer, author, songwriter and producer, China is the quintessential eclectic artist who embodies the American idea of an entertainer. This trait was inherited from her mother, the award winning American soul singer Dee Dee Bridgewater.

Marion Baglan is a soprano who turned to a solo career after her debut “I the Chorus of the Opera de Tours” in 1998. Marion has performed at the Petit Treavon, at the Palace of Versailles and in Lahore and Karachi in Pakistan. Here in India she is accompanied by pianist Francois Juskowiak and plays her roles with flair and panache.

Dobet Gnahoré, from the Ivory Coast has a warm extraordinary voice and mixes Mandingue melodies to Congolese Rumba, from Ivory CoastZiglibiti to Cameroon Bikoutsi, from Ghanian High-Life to Zulu choirs, to carry the compositions along with jazz-like sounds. Her music is funky yet delicate, forward looking yet mixed with traditional tunes and is irresistibly foot tapping.

The Sharik Hasan Paris Trio is an Indo-French group of three young musicians from diverse backgrounds. They got together in Paris in 2008 searching for a common musical vision. Their unique compositions result from a combination of different influences such as classical, hip-hop, rock and jazz with much improvisation.

Mayakkam Oxymore is an artistic and cultural merging of traditional art and new technologies of dance, painting and music from France and India. Each artist develops and validates his or her own craft, creating a show both visual and acoustic, where digital technologies become an extension of the performer, their movements and their gestures.

Isabelle Anna is one of the rare non-Indian dancers to be recognized by the Indian government as an ambassador of Kathak dance abroad. Along with her company Kaléïdans’Scop, she will present a performance in four acts going from the traditional expression towards the cutting edge of Kathak. “I speak Kathak” explores the visual and acoustic games of rhythms; “Toros” is a succession of 12 scenes on rituals and worship associated to the mythology of the Bull; “My Bolero” is a personal solo interpretation of the well-known Bolero by Ravel; “Trilogy” is a choreographic research on pure abstraction based on the music of the Italian composer Luigi Nono.

Mado, the widow in the shade tells us the story of women who are never the legal wives. They are the lovers, the mistresses or the concubines. These women live outside the rules of the society, and remain rejected. Valérie Berger is the artistic director of the Tétradanse Company, founded in 1992. The work of Valérie Berger raises the issue of the fate of women all around the world, and particularly in the countries around the Indian Ocean.

“French photographer Olivier Culmann, clicks people watching TV. He captures that instant when consciousness drifts, drugged by the phosphorescence of the cathode tubes. Nothing is more banal and unsettling. This is how, in this quasi-immobile passivity, with a numbed brain that television viewers receive the world in its entirety.” – Cécile Cazenave, Journalist

Widely exhibited, reproduced, borrowed and collected – Bernard Faucon’s works are one of the most original collections of the late 20th century. He is one of the first artists who has explored the universe of staged photography – the photographic “mise en scène”.

Debates and discussions in the fields of science and education with French and Indian experts will be hosted at the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore. As an extension of these, a symposium on sustainable development and a bilateral working group of education specialists will meet on an ongoing basis.

This program will bring together 30 leading French scientists from public and private research institutions. They will deliver more than 120 scientific talks in major Indian cities in a wide spectrum of fields, such as Laser & Plasma Physics, Aerospace and Aeronautics, Medicine and Infectious Diseases, Environment, Biotechnology and will encourage genuine bilateral dialogues on subjects of global importance.For more information, consult the French Science and Technology Service web site at: http://www.frenchsciencetoday.org/

Renowned French and Indian Chefs will bring to several Indian cities French savoir-faire so as to blend it with Indian culinary creativity in the domain of patisserie and cuisine. Workshops, wine training and tasting, institutional interventions and more to mark this festival of gastronomy – a veritable window to French Art de Vivre.