BRUSSELS, BELGIUM.- French Lille and Italian Genoa are already donning their best outfits to celebrate their selection as cultural capitals of Europe for 2004, a prediction of the widest and most wide-ranging offer of activities such as theater, dance, concerts, recitals and shows.

Lille, perhaps the least known, is a small northern France town that has already invested millions in remodeling streets, house fronts and plazas. It is the birthplace of General de Gaulle, and one of France’s more authentically preserved cities, as may be seen in the medieval Plaza De Gaulle, surrounded by a succession of attractive old buildings.

Lille proudly boasts  its Fine Arts Museum, housing around 3,000 paintings from Dutch, Italian, French and Spanish masters, among others, Goya, Rubens, Van Dyck and Monet. The city awaits visitors with an open and multicultural program articulated around a new way of understanding life in a northern town. The party will be in theaters, museums, gardens and kitchens.

Genoa, for its part, with a long cultural, artistic, commercial and industrial history, chose the trip as the guide for 2004 program of activities. There will be three theme tours:  Genoa, city of art  will be a trip through history and the city’s heritage, to wind up with the “Rubens age” exhibition; Genoa, the sea capital, is a way of looking at a culture linked with the sea and navigation, and Genoa, contemporary city, will be a tour through the relationship between architecture and painting, theater, music and literature.

The objective of The Cultural Capitals of Europe is to call attention to the huge diversity of that continent, without overlooking the common source.  Each year, one or two cities are selected, and this way obtain financial support to carry out all sorts of cultural events and revitalize their historic heritage. The title –selected in turn – is awarded by the governments of members states of the European Union.  In 2003, the city selected as European capital of culture was Graz (Austria.)

Originally, the program was scheduled to end this year, but after its success throughout the years it was decided to restore it for fifteen more years. The Irish city of Cork will be the first in 2005, and Patras (Greece) will be next.