Braque, Matisse, Picasso, Léger, Sonia Delaunay, Calder, Dubuffet, among other masters gathered for an exhibition around color. A free tour of modern art in less than eighty days, with 35,000 visitors, for 14 masterpieces from the National Museum of Modern Art – more than a third from outside the department, and a fifth from schools, with in particular almost all pupils in primary education in Chaumont and two-thirds of secondary school students, benefiting from the Centre Pompidou’s experience in mediation, which offers for the occasion new devices in modular and nomadic spaces designed by Patrick Bouchain.

These figures speak for themselves. The inaugural stage of the Centre Pompidou Mobile in Chaumont was a success.

This morning, I would like to highlight one essential aspect of this travelling museum: it is not a matter of creating ephemeral events. Of course, the capitals are back on the road; but the stage at the Centre Pompidou in Chaumont will have made it possible to build lasting partnerships with the communities.

With a third of the visitors who are not from the department, there is an exogenous dynamic that the Chaumont operation has enabled to update. Proof of this is the attendance at the last edition of the Chaumont book fair, the various cultural programs around the theme of colour, and the attendance at the city’s museums, In this case, the Museum of Art and History and the Crib Museum with its exhibition on polychrome sculpture and Andean, Italian and Spanish painting from the 17th and 18th centuries, which have seen their attendance double on the occasion of the presence of the Pompidou Mobile.

Beyond the support of my ministry, the success of this first phase of the operation also owes much to the involvement of the Ministry of National Education, but also to the patronage of the Total Foundation, the GDF Suez Group, Galeries Lafayette and Assurances La Parisienne, and with the support, for the Chaumont stage, of the Caisse des dépôts et consignations, of ANDRA, JC Decaux, Keolis and the Journal de la Haute-Marne. I want to thank all of these partners very much.

I attach great value, as you know, to the operations that make it possible to ensure better irrigation of our territories, so that we can give a new dynamic to cultural democratization. The Museums in Regions Plan clearly fits into this logic. The Centre Pompidou-Metz also, with its remarkable success in attendance since its inauguration in May 2010 by the President of the Republic: the remarkable structure designed by Shigeru Ban now welcomes a large audience, The European Union is also well ahead of its initial forecasts. Soon there will be the Louvre-Lens. In 2013, the Museum of Civilisations of Europe and the Mediterranean will open in Marseille, which will then be the capital of culture.

But it was also necessary to design initiatives that were adapted to medium-sized cities.

Cultural democratization and the conquest of new territories: this ambition is at the heart of the actions I have launched in favour of a shared culture. It is that of the Centre Pompidou mobile, this very beautiful initiative led by Alain Seban. Alongside the adventure of the Centre Pompidou-Metz, also that of the first season of «Un jour, une œuvre, un artiste» in the Paris municipalities, which I had the pleasure of highlighting at the Perreux a few days ago, one of the great admiral ships of culture in the capital plays the card of roaming in the region, in medium-sized cities, defending an ambition of direct contact with the work through a nomadic museum, offering a selection from one of the world’s most prestigious modern art collections. Investing in the fairground to better cross the threshold of museums is a great idea that we have put into practice with communities, starting with Chaumont.

Chaumont is also an ambition for graphic design, a field by definition multidisciplinary, temporary exhibitions at Silos, the house of books and posters, its International Festival which, with 23 years of existence, is a reference in the field. It is also the will of my colleague Luc Chatel, mayor of Chaumont, to transform his city into an international graphic design capital, like Saint-Etienne for design, by creating an International Graphic Design Centre, which will be launched at the end of 2013.

The link is now established. The Centre Pompidou, like the City of Chaumont, wants to continue their collaboration. The first realization of the latter is the Convention on an event concerning contemporary graphic design, the first of which will take place in May 2012. Its curatorial work will be entrusted jointly to the City of Chaumont, the National Museum of Modern Art – Centre for Industrial Creation and the Department of Cultural Development of the Centre Pompidou, with a planned annual alternation of the venue between Chaumont and Paris. The complementarity of the collections is clearly an asset, with those of Chaumont which concerns the Belle Epoque with the Dutailly collection and contemporary creation with its international competition, and those of the Musée national d'art moderne which concern the 1970s and 1980s.

Operations such as the Centre Pompidou Mobile make it possible to reach new audiences; they clearly break down the museum experience and help fight against the glass wall of social intimidation. They are also able to create new dynamics for the cultural network of partner communities and new partnerships for our public institutions. We have here, I believe, the two dimensions of an unprecedented operation, the success of which I am pleased to highlight today, before the next steps planned in the Nord-Pas-de-Calais region - in Cambrai, with a very strong expectation, and then in Boulogne-sur-Mer.

Thank you.