The city takes on colors! Festival of Lights in Saint-Raphaël – 20th edition
The city takes on colors! This year again, everything has been carefully prepared to make the Old Port and the city center put on their most beautiful coats of light. Dressed in lights, the streets of the city invite to night walks to rediscover the urban landscape.
Shows, parades, paintings of lights are projected on the buildings of the Old Port and on the Basilica, path of light, Ferris wheel, animation, cribs, concert, the 20th edition of the festival of light in St. Raphael, it’s all this at once! Until January 4, several thousand people invade the quays and streets.
This year, the show “Evasions Imaginaires” by Damien Fontaine is a dynamic sound and light show projected on the Basilica of Our Lady of Lepanto, to build the history of Saint-Raphael around the Petit Pri,nce by Saint-Exupéry.
This new 2017 creation on the Basilica of Saint-Raphael is designed in the form of a tale-show imbued with poetry and dreamlike.
The Story:
As the audience takes its seat, a little boy appears on the façade of the building. Installed in front of the sea, in a Belle Epoque atmosphere, he watches the boats sail away with his dreams of far away places. He loses himself in his thoughts, watching the clouds in the winter sky change according to his imagination. Suddenly, he hears his mother crying out to him in the distance. It is now time for him to go home because the Christmas Eve will soon begin, and he is very late… He then gets on his bike and pedals at full speed in the old streets of Saint-Raphaël, teeming with life. He jostles merchants and onlookers on his way, before falling into one of the many stalls. The mother then runs to her little “boy”, who really doesn’t know what he’s doing, picking him up to take him to the vigil that has just begun. Together, they enter the nave of the Basilica. The child looks around him and is suddenly transported into the convolutions of lights and colors emanating from the stained glass windows, to the sound of the great organs. It is a waking dream that begins wonderfully for him, drawing him into worlds more imaginary than the others. The little boy escapes to fantastic horizons, flying over incredible landscapes on his bicycle, now magically floating in the air, before plunging into the dizzying abysses of the sea, home to a sort of buried Atlantis, and having a wonderful encounter with another little boy well known to the people of Raphaël: The Little Prince invites himself as a “guest star” to the basilica and entrusts the child with petals from his precious rose. The petals, in a dazzling finale, metamorphose the place in a bath of optical illusions. Did the little boy really dream? No, because when he opens his hand, he discovers in its hollow the precious petals entrusted by the Little Prince. “Damien Fontaine.
You will also discover the enchantment of the automatons, place Coullet, characters of lights, various animations and different workshops, a show which will illuminate young and old