Roselyne Bachelot has just been appointed Minister of Culture in the new government of Jean Castex. During her handover with Franck Riester, she indicated her wish to "put culture at the heart of the reconstruction plan for our country". 

The new culture minister Roselyne Bachelot said on Monday that she wanted to "put culture at the heart of the reconstruction plan for our country" after the coronavirus crisis, during her handover with Franck Riester, an hour after his appointment. "I know that time is short," she said, while her predecessor had just mentioned the "curse of having the holder of this ministry change every 18 months" on average.

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"The absolute urgency at the start of this summer will be to help restart and restore cultural sites: festivals, museums, cinemas, historic monuments", assured the former minister of Jacques Chirac and Nicolas Sarkozy . "It is almost a matter of life and death for so many people, direct jobs and derivative jobs," she added, after stressing that the world of culture had "taken on the devastation of pandemic crisis ". 

"States General of Festivals"

This feminist on the right, lively, atypical and sometimes blundering, has already occupied three times the head of a ministry, had turned the page of politics after the defeat of Nicolas Sarkozy in 2012, animating chronicles on D8, RTL or RMC. "We are united by music, culture", she affirmed the evening of the appointment of Jean Castex as Prime Minister, welcoming the arrival of a "man of culture".

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During the transfer of power, Roselyne Bachelot wanted in particular to hold "in the coming days" "Estates General of festivals", affected by a wave of cancellation this year, "so that the next season regains its artistic vitality". She also said she wanted to "get involved so that theaters, opera and concert halls can restart" and "support the necessary restructuring to be carried out" in the print media sector and its distribution, which is going through a " existential crisis ". This piano lover (whom she has practiced since the age of 3 and a half) describes herself as a "crazy about opera". "I always dreamed of being Maria Callas", declared in 2012 to the JDD one who said "capable of making a round trip Paris-New York of a few hours to listen to a work at the Metropolitan Opera".

"Huge sites"

Regarding Franck Riester's assessment, she felt that it was necessary to "continue", "consolidate", "rethink sometimes". The Minister spoke of "deepening the library plan", making these places "meeting places" to "bring young people to reading", or "a calm progress report" of the Culture Pass, a 'access of young people to cultural activities, "to move from experimentation to generalization". She also cited "the profound changes that are restructuring the audiovisual sector", while former Prime Minister Edouard Philippe announced in mid-June that the provisions of the vast bill to reform the sector would be distributed in several other texts, due constraints linked to the post-Covid parliamentary agenda.

Other "huge projects", "preservation of copyright": it will have to decide what follow-up to Bruno Racine's report on the subject, submitted at the end of January, or even "the financing of our cinema". To accomplish these tasks, Roselyne Bachelot says she wants to "start immediately" to "work with other ministries", "deepen the links with local elected representatives, economic actors" and "decompartmentalize the public and the private sector".