Visiting Musée de la Chasse in the Marais is always a great experience, and this small and chic museum has become the best shared « secret » for demanding visitors. The reason for it is Claude d’Anthenaise, its excellent director. But it’s not always easy to revive an 18 th century house devoted to stuffed animals and paintings of hunters. … Read More
Daniel Buren Bristol style
After reading a portrait of architect Pierre Yovanovitch in the Figaro, I rushed to visit the new Kamel Mennour right bank gallery, on avenue Matignon (next to Baccarat) and this led me to Hôtel Bristol where Daniel Buren, the king of stripes, is showing a pergola. What fun !
Rodin welcomes sculptor François Stahly in Meudon
You might have never heard of François Stahly, the German born French sculptor, but you know his work if you have passed by the Eiffel tower once in your life: as a sculptor he designed wooden columns for the hallway of Maison de la Radio (visible when you attend a concert there) and a chimney across the Seine, which rises … Read More
Lin Utzon takes Venice by surprise
It was the opening of the Venice biennale for architecture and the canals were swarming with architects dressed in black, who had come from all over the world, so Lin Utzon’s vernissage was attended by guests from ten different nationalities. Friends had travelled from Copenhagen where she was born, Sydney where she grew up and Mallorca where she lives. All … Read More
At the Gobelins, Jean Lurçat tapestries and more
It is thanks to Guillaume Janneau, who used to run Le Mobilier National and its tapestry workshops, that Jean Lurçat (1892-1966) moved from being a successful painter to literally saving the art of French tapestry, in the 1940’s. « Four seasons » one of his masterpieces, was started with the war in 1939 and was made throughout until 1946.
Daniel Templon turns 50
To celebrate his fifty years as an art dealer, French galerist Daniel Templon, commissioned a book on his professional life by Sorbonne Professor Julie Verlaine. It is a history of the last fifty years of contemporary art and a page turner about a little man from the suburbs, who became very big through his passion for art and his love of … Read More
Arab gardens are full of teachings
There is a double attraction in visiting Institut du Monde arabe’s garden exhibition, « Jardins d’Orient, de l’Alhambra au Taj Mahal ». Since Jack Lang was named President a few years ago, it seems that this institution, created in 1987 by François Mitterrand, has taken on a new modernity. And what is happening in the arab world today, is drawing more … Read More
Charles Gleyre, a Swiss painter who taught Renoir and Sisley
With 120 paintings and many drawings, the exhibition at Musée d’Orsay, on Charles Gleyre, « The reformed Romantic », puts into light the work of a great adventurer who followed American Philanthropist John Lowell Jr, all the way to Khartoum after having studied watercolor with Bonington. He ran for 25 years, an atelier in Paris, where Renoir, Monet and Sisley studied as … Read More