After a strong six days attended by an estimated 50,000 visitors, Cannes Yachting Festival is already preparing for 2024, and there will be one big change to the programme.
The Cannes Yachting Festival, which was held in the glamourous French Riviera city from 12th to 17th September, attracted 600 international exhibitors and more than 50,000 visitors at an early estimate.
The initial feedback on the event, from companies such as global superyacht and luxury boat brokerage firm Northrop & Johnson, is also positive.
“Northrop & Johnson had 13 yachts for sale in Cannes this year and there was interest in all of them from qualified buyers,” said Patrick Coote, Northrop & Johnson’s European Managing Director, citing the high levels of interest and plenty of bona fide purchasers experienced during the show. “We expect to receive a good number of offers in the coming days and are confident of converting these to sales over the course of Q4 2023. The show just keeps going from strength to strength.”
MY Bunty, one of the 13 yachts available for sale with Northrop & Johnson. Photo courtesy of Relevance
PLANS FOR 2024
Although the festival is performing well with international stakeholders, 2024 will see some rather serious shake-ups to its format, notably in the layout and organisation of the event.
Cannes is preparing for a massive €56.2 million renovation of the famous Vieux Port, or Old Port, which will see the creation of a new car park and landscaped garden in the Laubeuf sector and a considerable extension of the Albert Edouard dock amongst other developments, and this is going to impact next year’s Cannes Yachting Festival.
The works will start at the end of this year, with a provisional completion date set for the beginning of 2027.
“The configuration of the 2024 show will therefore see the transfer of the reception areas from the Old Port, which have become unavailable, to the Port Canto, and will enable us to retain all the exhibitors and ships present this year,” says Sylvie Ernoult, the show’s manager. “To sum up, the 2024 show will extend even further into Port Canto, which will host two segments from the Old Port: the first dedicated to mega yachts, with 1,500m² of stand space on land and 500m² of space in front of the boats to welcome shipyards and engine manufacturers, and, afloat, some 15 units from 30 to 50 metres; the second will bring together around 100 units from eight metres upwards to over 380 linear metres, with 1,300m² of stand space on land and 400m² of space in front of the boats.”
A new walkway will create a loop around Port Canto, so visitors can get from one quay to the other easily. Port Canto will also still be home to the Espace Voile and the Yacht Brokerage area for companies like Northrop & Johnson.
Make sure you’re never left out of the conversation.
The long-awaited Psychiatry Day Centre for children and adolescents has opened in Beausoleil, a joint venture between the French and Monegasque health authorities.
The centre opened its doors on Friday 15th September, following the signing of a partnership agreement setting out its operating procedures between the Lenval Foundation and the Health Action Directorate.
The new health centre, located at 46 rue du Professeur Langevin in the town of Beausoleil, aims to offer comprehensive outpatient care for children and adolescents up to the age of 18 who present with complex psychopathological disorders.
The centre has a capacity for 35 places, including 17 reserved for children residing or attending school in the Principality who will be accommodated exclusively upon referral to a child psychiatrist from the Plati Centre in Monaco, as well as a medical-psychological centre for children and adolescents placed under the authority of the Health Action Directorate (DASA).
The day reception centred will work in close collaboration with those involved in healthcare, medical-social, national education, youth and sports systems established in the Principality.
Photo from left to right: Ronan Dubois, Directeur Général de la Fondation LENVAL; Jean-François Comas, Président de la Fondation LENVAL, Alexandre Bordero, Directeur de l’Action Sanitaire. Source: Monaco Government Communication Department
The Monaco Davis Cup team succumbed to a 3-1 defeat against Ecuador, as Guillaume Couillard’s men failed to reach the World Group I play-offs.
Prior to the tie, held at the Monte-Carlo Country Club (MCCC) last Friday and Saturday, Monaco captain Couillard rated his team’s chances of victory at “50/50”. The Monegasques fell on the wrong side of those fine margins, however, and in the wake of the defeat, will now have to fight to remain in World Group II.
Ecuador’s Alvaro Guillen. Photo by Luke Entwistle, Monaco Life
Valentin Vacherot and Ecuador’s Alvaro Guillen got the action underway under the beating sun at Court 18. Monaco’s top-ranked player took the first set, but his opponent broke back in the second, taking the tie to a tie-break, and winning.
Guillen then took the third and deciding set on a tie-break (6-3, 6-7, 6-7), getting Ecuador off to the perfect start, and leaving the Principality playing catch-up.
Lucas Catarina, against Ecuador’s top-ranked player, Emilio Gomez, levelled the tie at 1-1 on Friday afternoon thanks to a 6-3, 3-6, 7-5 victory. Everything was to play for heading into the second day of competition.
A rare doubles defeat
Monaco would have been confident of a doubles victory. Hugo Nys, a finalist in the Australian Open earlier this year, won alongside partner Jan Zielinski on clay in Rome in May, whilst Romain Arneodo reached the doubles final of the Monte-Carlo Masters earlier this year as well. Arneodo and Nys were fancied heading into the doubles match, but lost to Gonzalo Escobar and Diego Hidalgo (4-6, 2-6), leaving Monaco on the brink of defeat.
Gomez then put the nail in the coffin, beating Vacherot to wrap up the tie (1-6, 6-1, 1-6) and consign Monaco to a rare defeat. Monaco will soon find out their next opponents as they look to retain their place in World Cup II.
Make sure you’re never left out of the conversation.
For one month only, three rooms of the Prince’s Palace will house rare works of art by Pablo Picasso, revealing a little-known side to the great master of modern art.
It is “only natural” that this exhibition exploring the way Pablo Picasso reinvented the legacy of classical antiquity is displayed at the Prince’s Palace, Bernard Ruiz Picasso tells Monaco Life. It is here, in the Mediterranean, where his grandfather would spend long summers alongside his wife Olga Khokhlova, a Russian ballerina who had performed in the Principality.
It is also only fitting that for this, the 50th anniversary of Pablo Picasso’s death, Monaco hosts the exhibition in the Prince’s Palace; a place where 16th century frescoes featuring long-lost images depicting ancient Greek mythology, a subject that Picasso had been fascinated with for most of his life, were recently uncovered and restored.
Prince Albert with Curator Francesca Ferrari and Bernard Ruiz Picasso at the Prince’s Palace exhibition. Photo credit: Axel Bastello, Palais Princier de Monaco
Picasso’s insights into the survival of ancient artefacts
On Friday 15th September, Bernard Ruiz Picasso, who created the Fundación Almine y Bernard Ruiz-Picasso (FABA) from where all but one of the 30 works were sourced, guided the press, and then Prince Albert II, on a special tour of the private collection.
Curated by Francesca Ferrari, the exhibition shows another side to the Master of Cubism, who is most famous for his ability to break up subjects and objects, and rearrange the pieces in abstract form.
“We took the opportunity to explore a little-known facet of Pablo Picasso’s work, but a very important one, which is his life-long engagement with the art of antiquity, especially Greek and Roman antiquity, which started with his academic training in Spain at the age of 12 when he was asked to copy artefacts from ancient sculptures and ancient mural paintings,” explained Francesca Ferrari.
Picasso’s focus became more intense after visiting the ancient cities of Rome and Naples, and the archaeological sites of Pompei and Herculaneum in 1917.
In this exhibition, we see photographs of a 36-year-old Picasso standing next to various artefacts in Pompei – a defining moment in his artistic career.
“Picasso saw antiquity and its cultural and artistic heritage not as a model to passively copy or evoke, but something that he could transform, revive and even distort sometimes,” said the curator.
Prince Albert and Bernard Ruiz Picasso in front of photographs of Pablo Picasso at Pompei. Photo credit: Axel Bastello, Palais Princier de Monaco
A multi-faceted exhibition
The exhibition features paintings on canvas, including one of his grandmother Olga, as well as bronze sculptures and ceramics. But it is his drawings that dominate the exhibition and shed light on the incredible talent of Pablo Picasso.
“One facet that we explore in the exhibition, which I think is quite a novelty, is his meditation about the material conditions in which the artefacts from the past reach us in the present – sometimes they are fragmented, sometimes they are in pieces, sometimes their surfaces are eroded or partially erased, sometimes they are hidden under layers and layers of sediment just like the Palace frescoes were here,” said Ferrari. “Through all of these different lenses we consider Picasso’s long engagement with antiquity and show that antiquity for him was a powerful force, through which modern artists could revive and innovate the art of the present in a very avant garde and cutting-edge way. For him, antiquity and modernity were two sides of the same coin, two different languages that he could switch between.”
Pablo Picasso and Antiquity exhibit at the Prince’s Palace. Photo credit: Axel Bastello, Palais Princier de Monaco
“He was just a sweet grandfather”
Alongside the curator’s academic insights into Picasso’s works, Bernard Ruiz Picasso also revealed some lesser-known facts about the most prolific genius in the history of art. Picasso’s career spanned over a 78-year period, in which he created 13,500 paintings, 100,000 prints and engravings, and 34,000 illustrations. But he only signed the works he was to sell because “signing them all would have taken forever”. Apparently, in every place that Picasso lived or visited, he would fill the rooms with his artworks. After his death in 1973, his family discovered in an unlocked apartment in Cannes hundreds of Picasso’s art works.
Bernard Ruiz Picasso also divulged to Monaco Life the kind of person that Pablo Picasso was, beyond the artist.
“I was a little boy when my father passed away, so he was just a sweet grandfather who was always surrounded by other family members – on a beautiful beach in the Mediterranean, or going for lunch or dinner. He had a pretty positive energy that guy, and he was very tender, like a southern grandfather.”
Prince Albert with Almine Rech (forefront), Curator Francesca Ferrari and Bernard Ruiz Picasso at the Prince’s Palace exhibition. Photo credit: Axel Bastello,Palais Princier de Monaco
Accompanied by his wife Almine Rech, an art dealer and gallery owner, Bernard Ruiz Picasso – a resident of Monaco for five years – guided Prince Albert II of Monaco throuogh his grandfather’s works.
“Picasso is an incredible artist who knew how to reinterpret the themes of antiquity, and use them in his artistic style,” said Prince Albert. “This resonates in a completely unique way with the 16th century frescoes, which also deal with the heroes of antiquity, that were discovered and restored on the walls of the Palace. It’s a beautiful link between the different eras.”
The exhibition ‘Pablo Picasso and Antiquity’ will run until 15th October.
Princess Charlene flew out to her native South Africa to attend two important events linked to her eponymous foundation: a Learn To Swim clinic near Johannesburg and the South African edition of her popular Water Bike Challenge.
Last week, Princess Charlene spent three days in the Sun City resort near Johannesburg, South Africa on a solo overseas trip.
First on the programme for the former Olympic swimmer was a Learn To Swim clinic for more than 100 local school children that had been organised in partnership with Livesaving South Africa. It was a reprise of similar workshops that the Princess’ foundation has held for over a decade.
Princess Charlene is pictured alongside some of the children who participated in the Learn To Swim clinic in Sun City, South Africa. Photo credit: Palais Princier de Monaco / Monaco Communications Department
WATER BIKE CHALLENGE
Then, on Saturday 16th of September, the Princess was on the start line – or start pontoon – of the fifth Water Bike Challenge to launch the much-loved event.
It was the first time that the charity-focused competition had been held away from Monaco and the Mediterranean, but it was embraced by local crowds as willingly as by those at home in the Principality.
Ahead of the race, Princess Charlene spoke to the Monaco Matin about the necessary changes between this most recent edition and those that came before it, saying, “It will be a little different because the athletes will have to cycle on a lake. The racing conditions are necessarily different than in the Mediterranean, but the exercise is just as complex. I’ve already tried it personally. At sea, the current and the waves carry the water bike. On a lake, which is inherently calmer, more effort is required to pedal.”
The Princess personally competed in previous races, but this time cheered on the teams, who were comprised of local celebrities and athletes, from the sidelines.
After 15 kilometres of intense relay racing, it was the Bumble Bees who came out on top and were pictured celebrating with the Princess in photos released by the Palais Princier de Monaco.
All profits from the race will be heading to Lifesaving South Africa for its Learn To Swim programmes, as well as to a project for the preservation of rhinos and other endangered animal species, another cause dear to the Princess’ heart.
The first edition of the Monaco Pour l’Emploi job fair has been deemed a huge success after thousands of jobseekers turned up to meet with local employers from sectors such as construction, healthcare and finance.
Employers and potential employees had a special date on Friday 15th September: the very first edition of the Monaco Pour l’Emploi job fair at the Grimaldi Forum.
The event, which saw 150 professional federations and companies register, welcomed upwards of 3,650 job hunters and the queues stretched out of the doors.
The forum was opened by Monaco’s Minister of State Pierre Dartout, who was confident – and it turns out rightly so – that it would be successful.
“This day will undoubtedly be positive, both for businesses and for those looking for work,” he said at the launch. “Initiatives like these are particularly welcome in the current context. We are meeting a need which is incontestable and for which we must all mobilise.”
MULTIPLE SECTORS PRESENT
The companies at the job fair came from no less than 10 sectors, and included finance and insurance, hospitality, construction, business administration and services, tech, health care and social action, and yachting.
Monaco’s dedicated employment service, as well as the Directorate of Human Resources and Civil Service Training, the Monaco Social Funds, the Graduate Integration Commission and the Youth Employment Unit, was also there to hand out information on the regulatory framework of employment in Monaco to potential new workers and assist them in their job search.
“We must continue to stimulate employment by relying on promising initiatives, such as this employment forum, to try to attract as many future employees as possible to the Principality,” said Christophe Robino, Government Advisor-Minister of Social Affairs and Health. “Many think they cannot work in Monaco and this forum demonstrates the opposite.”
The organisers of the event are keen to remind jobseekers interested in working in Monaco that recruitment is continuing even though the forum is over. Such parties can send a CV to monacoemploi@gouv.mc. Equally, employers looking for workers can send offers to rdvemploi@gouv.mc.
