Henri Cartier Bresson, again… at Musée Carnavalet this time

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Les quais de la Seine, 1955, collection du Musée Carnavalet

It is a coïncidence that two large exhibitions of photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson are taking place at the same time. I already mentioned the clever one at BNF where four curators have chosen a selection in the same body of 354 works. This one at Musée Carnavalet, the Historical museum of the city of Paris, is organized with Fondation Henri Cartier Bresson and the great friendship between the two curators has done miracles. The two are very different, even though some pictures are common. Devoted to the photographer’s intimate relationship with Paris and his daily vision with historical  and geographical aspects of the city, it takes place in the new exhibition galleries which are very gracious and the hanging is particular interesting.Read More

Chagall and Modigliani share the bill at MahJ

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Marc Chagall, (Moyshe Shagal), The Father, 1911, Paris mahJ, lent by Centre Pompidou

Musée d’art et d’histoire juive is a quirky museum located in a beautiful hotel particulier of the Marais. And their shows are always interesting given the weird space which they have. (Chagall’s father hangs in the staircase…) The new exhibition “Chagall, Modiglinai, Soutine … Paris as school 1905-1940” is the fascinating story of artists born in  Russia and Eastern Europe, but also in Italy in Modiglinai’s case, who migrated to Paris and settled in Montparnasse around the café du Dôme (called les Dômiers) and La Ruche, an alley of studios which still houses artists today. The vitality of these foreign painters and sculptors is huge and many of them served in the French army in WWI and became citizens.

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Gustave Caillebotte in Martigny, such a discovery!

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A road in Naples, 1872, Private collection

Daniel Marchesseau was very happy at the opening of his new exhibition, “Gustave Caillebotte, Impressionniste et moderne” conceived for Léonard Gianadda in Martigny, Switzerland. It was delayed one year and hanging, at last, the 94 chefs d’oeuvres lent mostly from private collections, Musée Barberini in Potsdam, Petit Palais in Geneva… and from Musée d’Orsay (8 paintings) was a relief. He was happy with the color of the walls, a very particular red, which had been used previously by the Metropolitan Museum for its collections in Martigny. And the sun was shining brightly on this village below Verbier, where the lovely welcome by the museum staff made us all forget the four and a half hour train ride from Paris. As soon as you leave the train station, you run into multiple signs for the show and you realize how much Martigny is “Gianadda’s town”. The hanging is spectacular with the “Raboteurs de parquets” facing the “Pont de l’Europe” in multiple versions, in the main lobby. A concert with Swiss pianist Lionel Monnet playing the painter’s brother’s Martial Caillebotte‘s ballet music took place in the evening.  No rain and no umbrella this time but lots of gardens, flowers, boats and handsome young men. A new light is put on the painter (1848-1894) who died at 45 from a cerebral congestion, having delivered a very modern Impressionist style but, sadly, not enough works.

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Alfred de Montesquiou is back, with a novel set in Syria

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Famous war reporter Alfred de Monstesquiou won le prix du Livre de Plage

War reporter Alfred de Montesquiou,  studied journalism at Columbia University and worked for six years for AP in the Middle East and in Afghanistan. He then worked for Paris Match and won the coveted Prix Albert Londres for his coverage of the Lybian civil war.  He published a first non fiction work, “Oumma“, on his travels through Arab land from Morocco to Pakistan, which was a huge success and a fascinating read. He also did documentaries on the Silk Road and on Latin America. His latest novel, “L’Etoile des Frontières“, based on his multiple experiences of the Syrian war, has just won the first “Beach Book Prize” (Prix du Livre de Plage) president over by Jean Christophe Rufin and  awarded by Figaro Magazine, the city of Sables d’Olonne and the Fondation Minerve de Institut.Read More

At Château de Chantilly things are moving fast!

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Château de Chantilly, © Sophie Lloyd

A new music festival “Les Coups de Coeur à Chantilly” celebrating revered pianist Martha Argerich‘s 80 th birthday, a new administrateur général for the castle, Didier Selles who comes from the Louvre, and a popular “Fête du Terroir” the week end of the 26 th of June. On Saturday July 3, the film Vatel with Gérard Depardieu will be screened at night in the gardens with a cocktail bar and a festive pick nick. The Prince de Condé’s magical castle is moving fast and becoming a rival of Versailles and Fontainebleau with more recreational activities. And it has one of the most gorgeous painting collections in France!Read More

Jean Marie Rouart, César Garçon and Leonie Mason celebrate their ancestors’ talent

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Augustin Rouart, self-portrait with glasses, ca 1980, private collection

French Academician Jean Marie Rouart has made a name to himself in writing books, joining his close friend Gonzague Saint Bris and a group of young Romantics when he was in his twenties. He was a mediocre student and tried many times to pass his Baccalauréat but has since become a respected Academician. He has recently bequeathed to Le Petit Palais (whose director Christophe Leribault is the enfant chéri of Paris’ art scene), 12 paintings by his father Augustin, his great grand fathers Henri Rouart and Henry Lerolle and Maurice Denis. He was particularly moving at the inauguration when he described his father’s anti social habits and his own taste for honors.Read More

In Orléans, youth brings a new image of Velazquez.

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Diego Velázquez, Saint Thomas, Orléans, musée des Beaux-Arts

It all started because the town of Orléans on the Loire river (116 000 inhabitants) is one of the two only places in France (with Rouen) to own a painting by Spanish painter Diego Velazquez. The Musée des Beaux Arts is one of the richest in France due to large donations in the 19 th century, and it is well worth taking the one hour train ride to visit it on the occasion of the new exhibition “On the track of Velazquez’s St Thomas” curated by the very young Corentin Dury and with Guillaume Kientz’s expertise and writings. Thanks to the museums of Barcelona and Sevilla, there are three apostles, St Paul, St Thomas and another head by the master, united in what the curator calls the Apostolado, a word used by El Greco to describe a series of portraits of the apostles. Jusepe di Ribera, Luis Tristan and Francisco Pacheco surround the young Velazquez who painted this portrait while still living in Sevilla before 1623.Read More

Hotel de la Marine opens at last on place de la Concorde…

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Grand cabinet de travail de Thierry de Ville d’Avray, photo Didier Plowy, Centre des monuments nationaux

There was already Hotel de Crillon and Automobile Club, now we have Hotel de La Marine to balance them, all magnificent buildings designed in 1755 by Ange-Jacques Gabriel and fully restored today, with a unique view of what used to be place Louis XV and is now place de la Concorde. And this might seem natural, but if Olivier de Rohan and Pierre Achard had not reacted in 2009, when the sale to real estate mogul Alexandre Allard was being signed by the state, we would have had yet another luxury commercial center instead. Rohan asked Valéry Giscard d’Estaing to preside over Les Amis de L’Hôtel de la Marine and the sale engineered by former minister of culture, Renaud Donedieu de Vabre, was stopped. Read More