On Friday 26 and Saturday 27 of August, the fifth edition of the LaBel Valette Festival took place at the Château de Pressigny-les-Pins. A multidisciplinary festival dedicated to urban cultures. With the help of a hundred volunteers, this edition attracted more than 7,000 festival-goers. Divided in two stages, the concerts mixed hip-hop, electro and reggae music, where Fianso, Sniper, Tunisiano, Nuttea, Danitsa, Smokey Joe & The Kid, Dabeull performed. In addition to live paintings, many workshops were proposed : a stand to customize spray cans, an immersion into the previous editions murals thanks to augmented
reality, not to mention the Federation of Urban Arts, Urban Art Paris association and Belgian collective Propaganza stands. To brighten things up, Sisi la Paillette’s makeup artists have
put organic glitter on our faces and in our eyes !
When one thinks about the LaBel Valette Festival, it is first the artistic interventions on the castel which come to mind. Built in 1864 by Marie Joseph le Bouëdec, the castle of La Valette was occupied from 1893 by Viscount Albert Isle de Beauchaine and his wife. In previous editions, it was painted by Okuda (2018), 3TTMAN (2019), L’Atlas (2020), Astro (2021).
Former murals on the castle, Pressigny-les-Pins ; Okuda (2018), 3TTMAN (2019), L’Atlas (2020), Astro (2021) © FabeCollage
Each year the festival chooses a theme and for the fifth edition it is « Believe in your dreams ». A message of encouragement and hope for the last edition. This year, operating a change of scale with their proposal « Castles made of sand », it is for the artists Lek and Sowat to paint the castle. The French duo Lek (Frédéric Malek) and Sowat (Mathieu Kendrick), who have just produced a mural in homage to Jacques Villeglé (1926-2022) in the Tuileries tunnel in Paris, was formed in 2010 around their common passion urbex or the discovery of abandoned places.
Lek & Sowat, Castles Made Of Sand, Pressigny-les-Pins, 2022
For the five anniversary of the LaBel Valette Festival, the artists have recreated a beach with its sand and parasols, a last taste of holiday before the start of the school year.
Back when our dreams were sculpted in the sand, sheltered by castles washed away by the sea at the end of summer. On the castle we can read the names of the people who made this project possible, thanks to a delicate graffiti writing work, part of which is no more than a centimeter high.
« Castles Made Of Sand » des artistes Lek et Sowat pour le château du LaBel Valette Festival, Pressigny-les-Pins, 2022
But the castle is not the only one to host the murals of urban artists! In 1895, the Viscountess had a chapel built to receive the remains of herlate husband. After the interventions of the artists Matthieu Dagorn in 2018, Valérie Newland in 2021, ARDPG in 2019, Le Diamantaire in 2020, it is now the turn of Sylvain Ristori to invest the chapel of the domain with a two-tone architecture.
Sylvain Ristori, the chapel, Pressigny-les-Pins, 2022
From the 1930s to the 1990s, the castle was bought by the Spanish State and converted into a boarding school, which explains the presence of dormitories built in the 1970s. Since 2016, the abandoned domain of La Valette has experienced a renaissance under the impulse of the Urban Art Paris association and the creators of the LaBel Valette Festival, Mathieu and Sébastien.
Wuper, the former dorms, Pressigny-les-Pins, 2022
Sckaro, former stables, Pressigny-les-Pins, 2022
A shadow has however come to tarnish this festive weekend… It is the theft of the
photographers’ equipment and with it, professional shots of the last edition of the festival!
This is why the LBF team encourages you to share your pictures of the festival on the drive at the following address:
Text and photography : Marie le Palec