Ohko Ishida was born in Paris and has become a sculptor of hats
One evening, I received a very excited phone call from art curator Daniel Marchesseau. He was standing in a gallery rue de Seine, in front of a myriad of sculptural straw hats and wanted me to come and see them straight away. Which I did of course the next morning. And here they are… « Le coup de chapeau », an exhibition of creations by Ohko Ishida is taking place at Galerie de l’Europe until May 7 th.Read More
The mirrors of the Panorama reflect the cour carrée of the Louvre
For once, I was happy to have missed the opening of the show. Not only because my spies told me it was packed and the cardboard forest “Panorama” created by Eva Jospin at the Louvre was hard to see. But mostly because when I went this morning, I was greeted by my name by the most ravishing creature, a young artist called Iris de Turckheim.Read More
In the Winter garden, Royal parties take place between columns and palm trees
The two hundred meter long geranium greenhouse also has fuchsias dripping from the ceiling
Once a year at the end of April and for three weeks only, the royal greenhouses of Laeken, are open to the public. I had never heard of them until a dear friend who recently setteld in Brussels, asked me to go with him. It was paradise for two hours. The sky was undecided but we headed for the Belgian royal palace anyway, happy to enter the mysterious universe, where King Philippe and his beautiful wife Queen Mathilde, raise their four children.Read More
The warm and quiet decoration of the private room contrasts with the grim outside
Finding good Japanese restaurants that are not overpriced is not so easy in Paris and I was very excited when my blond Australian friend « who speaks Japanese fluently » took me to Kura, the ugliest looking place in the 16 th arrondissement near La Muette. Well it was a major surprise, for the food was delicious and the atmosphere lovely, with a charming Japanese manager who has been living in Paris long enough to be voluble and smiling !Read More
For two days last week, I kept on bumping into friends from London and from Provence who had come to Paris for the Hugos openings. Hugo like Victor Hugo, whose Museum on place des Vosges, is having an exhibition on “Five generations of artistic talents” by the famous writer’s heirs. But Hugo also, like Marie and Jean Baptiste, the two children of the very talented Jean Hugo, who are showing their work at Galerie Catherine Houard, near café de Flore.Read More
Apollinaire and his friends by Marie Laurencin, 1909
When you enter, the exhibition « Apollinaire le regard du poète » (the poet’s eye) at Musée de l’Orangerie in the Tuileries gardens, you hear the poet declaiming « Sous le pont Mirabeau coule la Seine et nos amours » one of his most popular poems. In front of you, sits a bronze of Arlequin by Picasso, 1905, and behind hangs Jean Metzinger‘s Blue Bird, 1912-13 and an African sculpture of Yombe or Woyo Fétiche. The tone is set. Apollinaire’s eclecticism is concentrated in this first room.Read More
Novelist Marie Darrieussecq in front of “Standing girl nude, turned to the left, arms crossed”, 1899. She is wearing an amber necklace similar to that of the painter
It’s always moving to discover a new artist who has been dead for over a hundred years. Paula Modersohn-Becker, was born in 1876 in Germany, lived in Bremen and Berlin, but spent a lot of time studying art in Paris. She died at 31 and is mostly collected in Germany. This is the reason why her first exhibition in France, at Musée d’Art moderne de la Ville de Paris is an event. Julia Garimorth, the curator, and Marie Darieussecq, her French biographer, have united efforts to rediscover this courageous artist. They were both guiding the visit at the opening.Read More
