Next week-end I'm invited to the Festival Ici et Ailleurs in Brest, a big sketchers and drawing reporters meeting.
This year's subject is seaside people, gipsies people. For the first subject, I'll present my drawn reports with fishermen in Senegal and Yemen (published in Spain, Demipage publishers). Then I wanted to learn more about the gipsies and begun a report...
I met a Rrom family. Three generations of adventures on the road, not travelling traditions, much more economic obligation. Here in France, children can go to school. "Here it's difficult, but in Romania it's so much more difficult."
Back home, I realize I don't know much about Rroms people. Anina Ciu Ciu's book "I'm gipsy and I remain it" has been a revelation to me : family values, studying hard and that's how a little girl exits the shanty town to study at the Sorbonne University... (Anina Ciu Ciu is also invited to the Brest festival, I'm looking forward to meeting her)
Then I discover Rroms, Manouches and gipsies all come from the same place in India, a long trip since the century XIII. They kept a lot of their traditions, such as iron work, music and dance.
Fortunatelly, I'm about to meet the Urban Sketchers Spain in Madrid, where Fernando Benito organised a sketching session at the Amor de Dios flamenco school. He introduces me to a flamenco dancers gipsy couple, lots of charism.
Later I go downtown to meet gipsies and speak about their daily life, and again high family values. As I also go to Barcelona, I meet catalan gipsies there, and an organisation which communicates about their inheritance. They just make fall down all the predjudices we can have...
Back to France, I begun to volunteer in a school truck in Lyon. I drew a full sketchbook I'd be glad to show you at Brest, just come and we'll speak about it !
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