“Notre Dame on fire”, by Jean Jacques Annaud, what a film!

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Thanks to this very special fireman, the fire was finally extinguished

I was so terrified by the film that it took me a brisk 30 mn walk to calm down. The music by Simon Franglen is poignant, the images very strong, and the filming in the Bourges, Sens and Amiens cathedrals perfectly credible. Produced by Jérôme Seydoux and written and directed by Jean Jacques Annaud, 78,  “Notre Dame on fire” is a very successful hour by hour description of what probably took place three years ago on April 15, 2019. The 1300 sacred objects were saved. No-one died. Amateur images of the real night were used to show the traffic jams and groups of prayer by the Seine. Based on the witnesses’ stories, the script cowritten with Thomas Bidegain, was imagined on the basis of 6 000 videos and photos provided by the public but also by the Elysée Palace. The story of Laurent Prades, the curator of Notre Dame, who was at a gala in Versailles when the drama erupted is very burlesque.Read More

Charles Camoin at Musée de Montmartre, a discovery

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Lola on the terrace, 1920, private collection © Archives Camoin ADAGP, Paris 2022

The two curators were really surprised but I had never heard of Charles Camoin before seeing the new show “Un fauve en liberté” (The Free Fauve) at Musée de Montmartre whose garden is waking up to spring on top of the Butte. His long career (1879-1965) started in Gustave Moreau’s atelier where his mother, a talented artist herself, had brought him in 1898. His father was a decorator and paint merchant in Marseille. Camoin often returned to Provence while working in Paris. He lived at some point at 12 rue Cortot where the exhibition is taking place. The latest show of his works was in 2016, at Musée Granet in Aix en Provence which focused on his Mediterranean origins.  He is known for having brought to Paris the southern light, the harmony of color, a lyrical realism which is associated to fauvism. Although very young when he arrived, he was immediately adopted by his life long friends Matisse and Marquet and by the circle of Montmartre impressionists.Read More

At Chantilly, Orientalism and a new administrator, Anne Miller

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Edward Lear, Sunset on the Island of Philae, Egypt, watercolor 1861 ©RMN-Grand Palais domaine de Chantilly, René Gabriel Ojéda

This year should be very festive for Château de Chantilly where a new administrator, Anne Miller, has just been named and the 200 th anniversary of Duc d’Aumale’s birth is being celebrated with two exhibitions of drawings and rare Arab manuscripts under one title “Le Duc d’Aumale and Algeria“. A show of Ingres drawings curated by Nicole Garnier, will open next June, a jazz festival will take place in July and a large Sound and Light night will take place in September. In the meantime, a tv series of the Three Musqueteers is being filmed with Romain Duris and of course “La Journée des plantes”, the major garden festival, will take place on 13-15 May. And two large portraits of Duc an Duchesse d’Aumale have been rediscovered in Versailles and are being restored by Les Amis du musée Condé in order to join the collections…

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Books on films, Films on books, Paris has never been more ebullient.

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Nicolas d’Estienne d’Orves signed almost two hundred copies at le Grand Rex

The publication of one of Nicolas d’Estienne d’Orves‘s book is always a fun and trendy event since 2001 when the hero of his first book was a cannibal. This time, “Ce que l’on sait de Max Toppard” (what we know of Max Toppard), was launched at le Grand Rex, a mythical movie theatre on the Grands boulevards, which also has a night club below. We all had popcorn and delicious champagne while NEO, as he calls himself, was signing books away. Almost two hundred as I was told on my way out… All the girls were ravishingly beautiful with blond hair including the mother of his son Valentin and grandparents, uncles and aunts were part of the event as well as his colleague at Albin Michel, the successful novelist Stéphanie des Horts, who is publishing her own book on Doris Delevingne at the end of April. Read More

Finland is everywhere with Edelfelt and Gallen-Kallela

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Virginie, 1883, Joensuu Museum of Art, collection Area Cederberg

It’s not easy to follow into Christophe Leribault’s steps at Petit Palais and Annick Lemoine was very graceful in acknowledging the remarkable work he has accomplished in his almost ten years there, as director. The new show “Albert Edelfelt, Lumières de Finlande” (Lights from Finland) is the last of the Nordic series which included, Sweden with the exceptional Anders Zorn and Denmark. It traces the career of this painter, Albert Edelfelt (1854-1905), who led the way to Paris for his compatriots, and was a great friend of France as well as a constant promoter of the independence of his country from its powerful Russian neighbor. His lively portrait of scientist Louis Pasteur, just after he discovered the vaccine against rabies, features in all French school books. I particularly liked the tenderness he includes in his portraits of women and children as well as his delicate snowy landscapes. Read More

Markus Lüpertz in Orléans, what a charmer!

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Hercules, study 32, 2010, photo Luc Bertrand/ADAGP 2022, in front of Hotel Grsoslot

There was a perfect harmony between the beautiful spring weather with a magnolia tree literally blooming under our eyes during lunch time, Markus Lüpertz‘ amazing invasion of the city of Orléans with eleven sculptures throughout the town center and 56 paintings and drawings in the Musée des Beaux Arts, and curator Olivia Voisin‘s charming and brilliant tour of the exhibition, “Markus Lüpertz, Le Faiseur de Dieux” (the maker of gods). With its 117 000 inhabitants and its cult to Joan of Arc, who freed Orléans from the English in 1429 during the 100 Year War, the charming town is located on the river Loire and is now populated with many former Parisians. They have no idea that their Museum has one of the richest collection in France with 16 th-18 th century paintings and the German 80 year old artist was happy to help them remember. His elegance, with a little ring in his right ear, a sculpted stick which he needs to walk since a car accident hurt his knee, and varnished shoes, was mesmerizing. But Der Krieger, the warrior, speaks very frankly.Read More

Women war photographers, it’s not a new trend!

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Gerda Taro, A Republican militiawoman training on the beach outside Barcelona, Spain August 1936

At a time when we constantly hear and see women reporters at war, you might be interested by the new exhibition “Women War Photographers” at Musée de La Libération de Paris, place Denfert-Rochereau, and realize that women were already active with their cameras in the 1930’s. Starting with Gerda Taro, a German Jew, who died at 27 in Spain while covering the civil war with her companion Robert Capa, Lee Miller in post war Germany, Catherine Leroy in Vietnam, … eight photographers were selected by the team of Felicity Korn at Kunstpalast Düsseldorf and Anne Marie Beckmann from the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation in Frankfurt where the exhibition was first shown. The question is: do women photograph war differently than men?Read More

At Bibliothèque Mazarine, Piranesi and Desmazières have a ball

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Erik Desmazières, Le Magasins central des Imprimés, planche IV, les réserves côté Ouest, 2013

I took a friend, who is a true Parisian, to the opening of Piranesi, Albert Decaris, and Erik Desmazières‘s exhibition at Bibliothèque Mazarine and Bibliothèque de l’Institut and he was mesmerized by the beauty of the library. At 70 he had never visited it. And this is true of many French people who have no idea that one of the prettiest spots within the French Academy is open to the public every day for the consultation of rare books. “Piranèse et son empreinte” (Piranesi and his printed influence) is the new show where disciples of the great  artist (1720-1778) are exhibited on the bookshelves of two beautiful libraries which are now twined under the leadership of Yann Sordet: Bibliothèque de l’Institut and Bibliothèque Mazarine. Read More