Metropolis Festival

Metropolis was the free one-day festival in the Zuiderpark, on the south bank of the Nieuwe Maas, in Rotterdam. The about page says that since 1988 it has put new music in front of a large public, bands and acts on the point of breaking through, and that good music has to be heard live. Stichting Nemesis organised it. Rutger Wolfson chaired the board. The director, on the grounds, is Saskia Piqué. The Sunday the visits close is 7 July 2024. The sheet calls it the 35th edition and keeps it free. If one summer is counted from 1988, that Sunday does not land on the 35th. Both counts stay as printed.

The homepage that still hangs from that day prints the hours 13:00 to 22:00. That is the sheet, not a report of when the last note sounded. The same text adds performance, film and street art beside the music. The information page says that, on average, some 30,000 find the park on the first Sunday of July. That is their usual figure, not a turnstile of that Sunday. It strongly recommends a bicycle or public transport. The rules for that year say you cannot park at Ahoy Rotterdam, that the Zuidplein garages have little room, and that there is park-and-ride at 15 metro stations, among them Alexander, Slinge and Kralingse Zoom. A June preview writes something else: enter near the Ahoy car park, and a day price that page works out at about 15 euros in car park P2. The two sheets do not describe the same gate.

The visit dated the day after that Sunday calls it a soaked edition. The municipal works pump out the drains. Children play in the puddles. The grass is saturated even inside the tent of the New Garden stage. The field stays empty for a good while. There are no queues at the beer stalls. People pack onto the picnic tables covered with canvas. Late in the afternoon the rain stops and a sun comes out. The magazine says the stages take revenge on the criticism of the previous year's programming. That is not an order of names. OPEN Rotterdam records Piqué on the grounds: it is the second time she organises the day, and she says she is not standing there as if it were the last. A man says he likes watching people and discovering new bands. A woman says you always have to go to Metropolis, despite the weather.

The money was already in the papers before the gates. AD, on 28 June, writes that the organisation had asked the city for 300,000 euros over four years and that, without a grant, the Sunday could be the last. The later notice says the municipal grants, on which the festival largely depended, were cut off entirely after a negative opinion on the culture-plan application for the stretch that opens in 2025. A motion passed unanimously by the city council returned a sum. Wolfson thanks the council and says the figure stayed far below what was needed. The foundation looked for the rest and did not arrive in time. It therefore declares that it is financially irresponsible to start preparations for the following summer. The notice calls that gap the first time in 35 years without a festival in the park. The foundation announces that it will soon cease to exist. Without a clear horizon, it says, the organisation cannot be kept.

Wolfson calls the day proof that there is a large and diverse public for a free festival, with a bold programme and young talent, often local, in a part of the city that receives little cultural subsidy. He says artists who are now known stood there before anyone had heard their name, and that for many people it was a first festival. He speaks of a petition that was answered in large numbers and of a slot on the Rotterdam Festivals calendar. He hopes another organisation will mount a similar festival. De Havenloods writes that the name may be used and that it is not required, and that a different free festival in the south would also do. Rotterdam Festivals, in that article, says plans for the following summer are handed in before 1 September and that they want to stress a free event in Zuid. That is a call, not a closed gate. These sheets do not close a day in the park after that Sunday.

Sleep was in the city. The day ends, on the sheet, at 22:00, and there is no camp. The official site is kept. The about text still speaks in the present, as if the day continued. The notice above it says the foundation is stopping. There is in these papers no later Sunday with closed doors.