Toyen, a revelation at MAM Paris

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The Blacks’ Paradise, 1925, private collection, with the authorization of Gallery Kool

Toyen was born Marie Čermínová in Prague in 1902. And she died in Paris in 1980 where she had lived for thirty two years in relative poverty but surrounded by very close friends. One of them, French writer Annie Le Brun, met her through André Breton in the 1950’s and co-curated the show of 150 paintings and drawings at Musée d’Art Moderne, Paris, after they were shown in Prague and in Hamburg. She always refused to be called a painter and even more a woman painter. She chose this name without a genre, supposedly short for citoyen (citizen). 

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Boldini is always the most elegant, at Petit Palais

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Firework, 1892-1895, Ferrare, Museo Giovanni Boldini

One thing is certain with Giovanni Boldini‘s retrospective at Petit Palais: the Italian painter (1842-1931) loved women and when he pictures them fairly denuded in pastel or lavishly dressed in full length portraits, they are always sensuous and beautiful. Yet he was not handsome at all, quite the contrary as described by his best friends. He was so short that he was not accepted in the Italian army. The show of more than 150 paintings, opening today, is a perfect moment of elegance and aesthetics. The different rooms painted in bright red, in greys, in plumb color or in green, reflect the different stages of the Ferrare born artist’s career, who spent 60 years of his long life in Paris. A true star in Italy, he had not been shown in France since 1991 at Musée Marmottan. And it is a real firework that we are invited to see. Read More

Fondation A.R.CA.D celebrates its 15 th anniversary with great news

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Professor Aimery de Gramont with Doctor Lama Sharara, director of the foundation, photo Quentin Chevrier

It’s always fascinating to meet brilliant oncologists who are uniquely modest and the celebration of the 15 th anniversary  of the A.R.CA.D Foundation for digestive cancers at Cercle Interallié, was a great moment of scientific excitement and family spirit. The President founder, Professeur Aimery de Gramont, was surrounded by his disciples who have all become successful researchers themselves. With Mariella de Bausset, he created this foundation on December 22, 2006, with funding by Roche laboratories. It has now evolved with several International groups, the ARCAD Groups, bringing together over 80 eminent oncologists from around the world, who do research on colon, pancreatic and liver cancers. Three leading doctors gave the results of their recent studies, Professor Julien Taieb of Hôpital Européen Georges Pompidou, Professor Thierry André of Hôpital Saint Antoine and Doctor Cindy Neuzillet of Institut Curie. And two patients, Serge Balmayer and Doctor Bruno Genevray  testified on their very rare recovery.Read More

The best and the worst, make your choice

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Xinyi Cheng, “Resolutions”, 2020

What a relief to see at last a good painting exhibition at Lafayette Anticipations with the Chinese artist Xinyi Cheng show “Seen through others” and how sad to see the nightmarish “Pionnières” (pioneers) at Musée du Luxembourg. At least we have the choice not to go… I watched the new series on Netflix, “Drôle” (Standing Up),  written by Fanny Herrero, who is now famous for having been the screen writer of  “10 %” (Call my agent). It is the story of three French stand ups and it’s hilarious. At Nathalie Obadia‘s gallery on rue du Faubourg St Honoré, photographer Valérie Belin is showing eleven “Modern Royals” and I met the new President of Paris +, the Modern and contemporary art fair… and in Giverny at Musée des Impressionnismes, Rothko confronts Monet.Read More

At Musée Guimet, every floor has a show

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Chiharu Shiota, Living Inside, Courtesy the artist and Templon, Paris – © Adagp, Paris, 2022, photo Thierry Ollivier

On the top floor of Musée d’Art asiatique, Mnaag, which you access by the elevator and a few more steps, Chiharu Shiota, the Japanese artist, has stretched her red threads across the rotunda. Like many other artists, she has worked during the last two years on the importance of one’s home and the domestic space. Below, in the Japanese galleries and in the library, she shows four more boxes in black and white which make us wander around the rich collections. On the lower floor an exhibit of Sabres illustrated in prints and paintings takes the whole space while Yoga is the theme of the first floor gallery. Read More

At l’Orangerie, colour explodes in Impressionist painters’s decors

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Claude Monet, Les Dindons, (turkeys) 1877, unfinished for the living room of château de Rottembourg, belonging to the Hoschedé in Montgeron, Paris, musée d’Orsay, bequeathed by princesse Edmond de Polignac born Winnaretta Singer, © Musée d’Orsay, RMN-Grand Palais / Patrice Schmidt

It is again a well researched show which Musée de l’Orangerie is presenting with one hundred paintings and objects by the Impressionists which were important in the development of a new decorative language at the turn of the century. Dismantled dining rooms or country houses lead to framed flowers and boaters which were originally part of a series. “Le Décor Impressionniste, Aux Sources des Nympheas” (Impressionist Decorations) is the story of how Caillebotte, Mary Cassatt, Monet, Morizot, Renoir, Marie and Felix Bracquemond, Boudin and Manet delivered everyday life items such as fans and plates, but also murals in Cézanne’s case, panels and doors in large castles. Curated by Sylvie Patry and Anne Robbins, it is a luminous show which starts with “peintures idiotes” (absurd paintings) and where flowers and gardens play a large part. Monet’s Water Lilies “the great decoration” (as he called them) hailed by André Masson as the “Sistine Chapel of Impressionism” are permanently visible upstairs in the museum’ two oval rooms.Read More

So many things to do in Paris and so little time…

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At Opéra Garnier, choreographer and music composer Hofesh Shechter received a standing ovation with the orchestra suspended in the clouds

Hofesh Shechter, OBE, the Israeli choreographer whose mother is Ukrainian, had a spectacular première at Opéra Garnier for “Uprising” and “In Your Rooms”, two vibrant ballets created at The Place and Sadler’s Wells in London more than fifteen years ago. They are now both part of the Repertoire of the Paris Opera. Sophie Calle attracted the contemporary art world at Musée d’Orsay for her series “The Ghosts of Orsay” on the Museum when it was a hotel in a train station. Her obsession with hotel rooms is deployed here as she collected hundreds of messages left by the occupants of room 501 in 1978. At Fondation Azzedine Alaïa, a show describes, with dresses and photos, the beginnings of the couturier in Paris in the 1950’s. At Galerie Lelong, Tàpies and Desgranchamps have a beautiful time. And Fragonard reopens its Musée du Parfum across the street from Opéra Garnier.Read More