Monthly Archives: January 2013

Inès sez…

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Inès sez…
To heat things up this winter wear a lacy bra under your cardigan, its the sure fire way to keep the gentlemen around you feeling a little hot under the collar.

Inès is the face of l’Oreal Rivatlift, for heaven’s sake! She’s fifty! I know women who believe that turning fifty is going to be the beginning of the end, but Inès knows better. She’s French so she knows, unflinchingly that there is no age for being hot, it is all about style and owning your sexuality. Even my daughters’ 72 year old French Mamita turns men’s heads with her elegant chignon and pencil skirts and winter is no reason to cover up.

This understanding is one of the things I adoooore about living in Paris. I don’t have to go to workshops to remember that being sexy is a great, healthy part of life, I’ve got women like Inès and the ads on bus stops to remind me that there is no age for workin’ it!

 

What sized Palais?

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Après notre petite soirée romantique à l’expo Hopper, on avait des réservations au restaurant le MiniPalais, qui est dans le Grand Palais, parce que ça crée la confusion et pour le coup on est bien content quand on y arrive.
La conversation est un peu comme ça.
– On va où pour dîner ?
– On va au MiniPalais.
– Ah, c’est en face, il faut traverser. Je ne savais pas qu’ils avaient en restau.
– Comment ? De quoi tu parle ? On ne traverse pas ! Non, mais, ça, c’est le Petit Palais.
– Et on ne va pas au Petit Palais ?
– Non, nous allons au MiniPalais.
– Mais ça, c’est le Grand Palais !
– Tais toi et fait moi confiance.

Ouf, effectivement j’étais bien content d’arriver devant l’entrée du restaurant. Ce n’est pas parce que Mr French est français qu’il connait Paris ! Le MiniPalais est un énorme hangar, ultra chic avec un décor atelier d’artiste. Le sol en parquet, des toiles de bateau sur un mur, des morceaux de sculpture grecque sur un autre et une vitre qui donne sur le nef du Grand Palais. Comme dirait mon ado, c’est très stylé.

Surtout la grande terrasse avec ses colonnes impériales, ses palmiers, sa vue sur le Petit Palais et l’accompagnement d’un bon cocktail, si bon que le restaurant attire une clientèle plus tôt jet set et très Costes. De temps en temps ça me branche d’être entourer de très belles femmes et leurs hommes parfumés. On entre dans un autre monde, le dépaysement est assuré.

Eric Frechon, le chef étoilé du Bristol est aussi chef des cuisines du MiniPalais. Il nous offre une carte qui assure cette dépaysement ; créative avec une forte influence internationale et un esprit légère où le tamarin côtoie le tandoori et du piment d’espelette.

Dans les assiettes c’est bon sans être gastronomique, il y un déséquilibre décevant entre certain plats. La soupe de champignon avec châtaigne et foie gras était riche en saveurs avec des textures qui plaisent au palet, or le crabe en rémoulade était sans intérêt. Le saumon écossais était complètement fade, mais le cabillaud nacré de tamarin agréable en bouche. Rien n’était excellent, mais rien n’était mauvais non plus.

Entre le beau monde, une carte fusion et des plats quelconque, on avait la sensation d’être dans un restaurant Costes avec un twist.

After the Hopper show, we had reservations at the Mini Palais. What with all their masculine and feminine, and the dreaded subjunctive, it seemed natural that the Mini Palais would be in the Grand Palais, just across from the Petit Palais. Mr French had a hard time with the concept, and was sure I was leading him astray.

Which is why I was glad when we finally walked up the stairs and found the right entrance. Mr French was glad because there were two drop dead gorgeous woman standing there in form fitting black dresses, waiting to seat us.

I love the space of the Mini Palais. An enormous loft, it was designed to look like an artist’s studio; a very rich, not very productive artist, who collected bits of Greek sculpture and sewed up a few sails to make his drop cloth, which he hangs on the wall. Exactly the kind of artist who would hang out with the international jet-set crowd that fills the tables at the Mini Palais.

There is no artist. The crowd comes for the cool space and the even cooler terrace that features imperial columns, a mosaic tiled floor, palm trees, a fantastic view of the Petit Palais and excellent cocktails.

Eric Frechon, the Michelin starred chef of the Bristol is the executive chef here and her has put together a fusion menu with tamarind, tandoori and piment d’espelette all in a row. The food is good, without being great. Some of the dishes are disappointing, like the somewhat boring crab in remoulade, or Mr French’s tandoori salmon. While other dishes were actually excellent, notably the rich mushroom soup with chestnuts and foie gras.

Le Mini Palais is a fun place to dine after a late night visit to the museum or when your itching to pass some time with the see and be seen crowd, but what I really love is going for the cocktails on the terrace, which gives me another reason to look forward to the spring!

 

Hopper

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                                                                photos courtesy of ibiblio

version anglais en bas de la page…

Je ne sais pas ce qui se passe à Paris, mais j’ai l’impression que tout le monde est devenu amateur d’art avec des queues insupportables devant tous les musées de la ville. Il nous a fallu trois visites au Pompidou pour osé Dali, on a raté Guardi au Jacquemart André et c’est seulement grâce à une prolongation qu’on a pu voir Hopper ce weekend.
On a quand même hésité. Avec les foules comme ça on n’a pas le temps de vraiment apprécier la collection. Mais je connaissais peu sur cet artiste et j’avais une grande curiosité. Et, la gourmande que je suis, j’étais motivée par nos réservations au Mini-Palais pour après l’expo.
L’oeuvre de Hopper est relativement petit, que 100 tableaux, 26 graveurs et une poignée d’aquarelles. Le tout est présenté en ordre chronologique, ce qui a démontré l’évolution de cet homme en tant qu’artiste.

Pour enrichir l’exhibition et démontrer le parcours de Hopper, les oeuvres de ses collègues et de ses amis, des artistes comme Degas et Pissarro sont exposés dans les premières salles. Ce sont les oeuvres qui ont influencé, enrichi et défini le travail de Hopper.
L’exhibition commence avec son apprentissage avec Robert Henri. Dans les tableaux mono-chromatique de son copain George Bellows on distingue déjà un intérêt pour l’architecture, la puissance de la géom’trie, la force de la solitude.
Après ses études Hopper se rend à Paris et rencontre l’Impressionisme. C’est ici sur Degas et Pissarro qu’il développe sa palette et étudie la lumière. Pour gagner sa vie, il travaille comme illustrateur publicitaire.
Hopper déclare que c’est en travaillant en graveur qu’il a trouvé sa voix et c’est dans cette salle qu’on voit la solitude sans relâche : l’homme qui surgit des ombres à côté des rails d’un chemin de fer, la maison isolée avec la silhouette d’un homme, deux pêcheurs sur un bateau seule face aux vagues. Et vous observez tout ce “seule” dans une petite pièce pleine de visiteurs. Vous êtes bousculé, poussé, entouré, mais infiniment seule. La juxtaposition est époustouflante.
Bientôt vous descendez et vous êtes avec ses tableaux, au peu près une quarantaine, ce qui êtes impressionnante pour une exhibition sur une artiste de cette importance. Et facilement, sans trop y réfléchir, vous observez d’autres thèmes. Chez Hopper, la lumière, elle est jaune, les ombres sont fortes et le vert est presque une personnage, tellement c’est présent dans son oeuvre. Il y a des angles, presque toujours un angle fort qui traverse le tableaux, montant de la gauche au droite. Et encore l’immobilité.  Une danseuse burlesque semble être figée sur scène, son pianiste ne bouge pas, non plus.
Je n’ai vu qu’un seul toile avec du mouvement, The Bridle Path avec des chevaux qui courent vers un tunnel, les cavaliers anxieux et mal à l’aise. Ce n’est pas un grand tableaux et ça démontre bien pourquoi le meilleur de Hopper ne bouge pas. Ce qui est sans importance, parce que c’est l’émotion, une solitude sans pitié qui nous remoue chez ce grand artiste.

Last week a friend went to see the Hopper show and afterwards pronounced that she’d been very disappointed. The crowds were thick and there’d been very few paintings. This made me a bit hesitant about heading out into the cold on Sat night for our 20h30 reservations to see the show, but my instincts told me that this was an important show for me to see.

There was a lot of confusion at the entrance, with three separate queues for ticket holders, non-ticket holder and some swanky private party guests.  I was starting to think that maybe I should listen to my friend and try to scam my way into the party, but this was a date with Mr French and that is not his style. We’d be doing what we’d set out to do; see the Hopper exhibition.

The format and layout of an exhibition are almost as important to me as the content of a show, and in this show, the presentation was nothing short of sensational from an intellectual perspective. The curator presented Hopper’s work chronologically, grouping everything by periods.

I could immediately understand why my friend felt their were few paintings; Hopper’s entire oeuvre is only 100 paintings, so the show starts out featuring the work of his friends, colleagues and collaborators. But, by the end of the show I had (very unscientifically) counted about 40 paintings, which means that those attending the show got to see a very large percentage of his work, which is incredibly rare for a show featuring an artist of Hopper’s importance.

First, there is his work as a student with Robert Henri and when you see the monochromatic grey paintings of his fellow classmate George Bellows, you suddenly start to “get” Hopper. Then there is the art from his Paris years. Unexceptional, except this is where he really seemed to master his sense of lines and boundaries. And you can clearly see the influence of his impressionist friends Pissarro and Degas on both  his subject matter and his palette.

You then see his work as a commercial illustrator, followed by his first American paintings. Again, there are paintings by the friends and colleagues that inspired and influenced his work and it is at this moment that I started to see a theme; solitude. All the influences in Hoppers art and nearly of all of his subjects, from two sailors at sea to a solitaire home, from a person emerging up next to railroad tracks to the customers at a coffee shop in his seminal work, Nighthawks, Hopper’s work defines alone.

The show has drawn over half a million visitors and as you strain to study the etchings that helped him find his “voice” as an artist you are jostled by a tight crowd, bumping into people every where you turn, yet absolutely surrounded by alone. It is a impressive juxtaposition.

As the show continues, so does the solitude. And you may start to notice other themes. In Hopper’s world, light is yellow and shadows are clearly delineated. Green is every where, always brightly toned, in a multitude of hues from kelly green grasses to lichen green wall paper. Life exists at a tilt with sharply illustrated diagonals, general one very clear diagonal per image, often running up, from left to right. And finally, the stillness. Even a burlesque dancer in the Girlie Show looks completely still, although her arm is raised and she is clearly on stage.

The only painting with any serious movement, The Bridle Path, is of three horses racing into a tunnel, their riders looking awkward and reticent to advance. It is not a great painting and does a lot to show why Hopper’s best work is absolutely devoid of any motion. But not Emotion. Hopper’s painting are full of that; solitude and loneliness abound and it is this intense feeling he provokes in the viewer that makes him a great artist.

Coats

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When we first met, Mr French was a bit concerned with my lack of fashion and thought I needed lessons in chic. He did not get my California hippy penchant for large, clunky shoes in odd color combinations, like fushia trimmed vomit green. Or my handbags that could double as a stuffed animal which I alternated with my equally inappropriate ‘Eastpak’ collection. He has since ‘corrected’ my ways and helped me develop a rather unhealthy habit regarding both shoes and bags.

These days, he can not understand why I still insist on wearing my threadbare, black frock coat when I could wear my other, perfectly modern, black wrap-around coat.

“But it’s from the 1940’s.” I whine.

“Yes, and it looks like it.” he reposts.

He’s right. The lining is shredded, the sleeves are worn and there is no button hole, so the coat can not be closed to ward off the winter winds. It is a little nutty to be wearing torn, worn out clothing when there are practical, yet gorgeous alternatives just one hanger over.

I bought the frock coat at one of those rag dealers near Les Halles when I was a starving student here in the 90’s. I was with my brother, and being a fille from la Californie, I didn’t own a decent coat. I found this one and have loved it ever since I loved it a little more when a tailor taught me it was a redingote, a traditional  French style that draws its name from the French trying to say “Riding coat” around the time of Marie Antoinette. I still loved when that same tailor mistakingly removed 6 inches from its length.

I have, it would seem, a passion for vintage coats. Like my 1950’s Paris couture black velvet, A-line coat with wide 3/4 length sleeves and a zoot suit lapel, or my 1960’s baby llama’s wool coat with jet black buttons (and holes torn under the arms). I’m missing the 70’s, but the 80’s are represented by my purple, inverted fleece Norma Kamali wrap around coat that I bought new for a small fortune and have worn ever year since then. The 90’s I went classical with a Burberry trench.

Now that we’re on to the next century Mr French is trying to show me the evil of my ways. He has guided me in the purchase of a grey Max Mara; practical, but boring and its already fading at the sleeves after just a few years!!! IHe has even gotten me into a warm, sensible, yet dreaded for being totally un-stylish, yet heart breakingly trendy Moncler, which my daughters hope I tire of sooner, rather. And I’ve acquired a lovely black cashmire trench style from Paule Ka that I love and look forward to wearing as vintage some day!

 

Friday@Flore

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SMILE everybody, it’s a snow day!!!

These photos were taken over the weekend, when it really was snowing outside and blustery and beautiful. Today we’re back to DIOR grey skies with sub zero temperatures.

Loving the gloves. All that slush and nasty wet stuff on the ground means most parisiennes are wearing practical shoes. Does not happen often folks, so to lighten the moment, fun little touches like these gloves are being slipped on.

Sitting in the Flore enjoying a “noisette” that I dosed with a healthy serving of Mr French’s chocolat chaud, I noticed a lot of gorgeous handbags. I don’t know if this is because all the black coats guaranteed we’d see the bags, or if it is because everyone is desperate for a splash of fashion, which is not easy when bundled up like the Michelin Man.

 

And just like the crowd leaving the Chanel Haute Couture show, St Germain’s golden youth was getting their fur on. Even the boys.

 

 

 

 

 

I loved this lady’s snow day attire, a splash of instant sunshine. I am sure that she has read the poem, “When I’m an old lady I’ll wear purple.” She may have even scoffed at the thought of ever being an old lady herself, despite already being old enough to be my grand mother.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

People were staying close together, supporting each other when the going got difficult and generating some mutual warmth. It was a loverly day for a stroll.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I had to stand out in the cold much longer than usual to get these shots, as more people than usual stayed inside. But looking at them now I feel like maybe I need to be thinking about the roll of fur trim in my wardrobe. And I’m going continue wearing that chunky wool scarf that M just knit for me me last week, it is more in than I ever imagined!

Inès sez…

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Confession time… don’t you love confessions? They’re so dramatic, n’est-ce pas? Especially as the confessor beats around the bush, writing in circles and dragging it out in an attempt to create tension for the dramatic unveiling when she announces that has a crush. A girl crush. I chose the word confession because it is no secret among friends and family that I absolutely adore, respect and admire Inès de la Fressange. I think she’s elegant, cool and terminally chic.

Despite my advanced age, I dream of being Inès some day when I grow up, but I can’t: too short, too wide and and then there’s that whole mistake about being born in to a family without a de…. attached to their name. But I try!!! Really, I do.

In case you don’t know who Inès is, she is a model who was once Karl Lagerfeld’s muse, then married a fantastic man she was very much in love with, had two gorgeous daughters and started a career as a designer in her own right. There were bumps along the way; a falling out with Lagerfeld, the death of her husband and the end of her fashion line. But she gets back up and starts over again each and every time, which is what I admire
most about this lady In her most recent incarnation Inès is the spokesperson for Roger Vivier shoes and the author/illustrator of La Parisienne, a book that imparts the secrets of Parisienne style, teaching a girl like me (or you) how to be chic. Like a Parisienne. Like her!

Clearly I am not the only one who dreams of having a smidgen of the de la Fressange style, because the book sold well and after the book there were agendas in which Inès shares her favorite tips on style and lifestyle. Her gems always seem to strike me as good ideas, sometimes funny, usually relevant, so I thought I’d share them here with you, a multi cultural blend of Inès’ thoughts and the thoughts they inspire inspire in me…
There is a thought a week in each agenda, as well as an entire book on her thoughts, so this is not an article, it’ll be a regular little pow-wow over here at FindingNoon. I warned you it was something of an obsession!!!!

Inès sez…
To deal with the extra weight gained over the holidays…

go to the gym! JK!!! No, she’s way to kind to say something like that.That was the pragmatic little yank in me who fininshed off her sentence before reading it through.

What she really advises is to wear an over sized sweater with straight legged pants. And she adds that its ok to leave the pants unbuttoned if you’ve really gone to town on the foie gras (not joking, she says that) during the festivities.

I love that she recommends pants, not leggings and not skinny jeans, because even if she can pull them off, they’re really not flattering on your average full grown female. I mean, they look fantastic on my 15 year old, but you know, she’s… Fifteen!!!!

Oops. Just read the next line of her notes, and yup, she does say to go to the gym, only she puts it more kindly….. Reminding you to keep your resolution to go to the gym, the one she is absolutely confident you’ve already made because, well, you know, she believes we’ve all got our inner chic going on.

Off for a run folks…. and while I’m out there, tell me, how do you deal with your winter fat?

Chanel Haute Couture

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Paris Fashion Week est de retour, mais c’est trompeur, car il ne s’agit pas d’une semaine, mais de plusieures, enchaînées dans les grandes villes du monde. Tout de suite après une semaine pour les hommes, c’est au tour de la haute couture.

Haute Couture appartient à un tout autre univers que le prêt-à-porter que j’ai suivi en septembre. Même les journalistes arrivent avec un sac Birkin suspendu sur le coude,  les gardes du corps n’ouvrent pas la porte à n’importe qui sans invitation officielle et ceux qui arrivent en retard restent les bienvenus. C’est le monde des VIPs !

N’etant pas une fashionista confirmée, je suis condamnée à rester dehors avec les autres ; journalistes, bloggeurs et designers en germe. À l’intérieur il y a les privilegés, le monde de la mode et des belles. Très, très belles, comme Inès de la Fressange qui tweetait des photos des ensembles richement élégants qui passaient devant ses yeux. Et quelle chance, elle a twitter la robe de mes rêves (1000 mercis Inès !!!)

Dans les tweets j’ai remarqué des plumes. Beaucoup de plumes, ce qui ne m’etonne pas vraiement. Je les ai vu pour les fêtes chez Zara et H&M, sans parler de Brunello Cucinelli qui ornes des simples chemises en plume de boa. Soit j’ai une obsession ornithologique, soit les plumes sont ‘in’ !

 

 

 

 

La fourrure est à la mode aussi. Pas forcement sur scène, mais sur chaqu’une des spectateurs. Chapeaux, manteaux, gants, bottes, tout le monde était à poil !!!

 

Its Paris Fashion Week, yet again. That’s a lie, folks. There isn’t a fashion week. There are several weeks, one blending into the other in all of the major cities across the globe. This week’s fashion week is Haute Couture (last week it was men’s fashion).

Haute Couture serves a different clientele, so it brings in a different crowd. Even the journalists for these shows are toting Birkins, the guards don’t let in wanna bes like me without an invitation just because we look particularly deserving, and late comers are allowed entrance, this is haute couture after all, and everyone is a VIP!

My dream dress...

I stood outside with fashion journalists, bloggers and someday designers while the affluent and influential, the stylish and the gorgeous folk, people like Inès de la Fressange sat inside, tweeting each outfit, including my dream dress(es) and showing us what was coming “in”.

As people came out of the show they were happy and smiling and I even heard one American repeat the word “gorgeous” several times. This is extremely enthousiastic compared to anything I witnessed while stalking the prête à porter scene.

From the tweets, I saw feathers, lots of feathers. Which isn’t exactly a shock. I saw them on dresses at H&M and Zara this holiday season and Brunello Cucinelli has been using them as shirt collars for a year or two now. But this is Karl, so its official, they’re in.

Another ‘in’ is fur. It wasn’t in the show, but it was on pretty much everyone who attended the show. From hats to muffs, trimming coats, shoes and gloves, the fur was flying!!!

 

 

+ d’images….

 

Frenchie

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There is a very popular local restaurant called Frenchie. Google it and it comes up in both French and Anglo press. One of the English language foodie sites even has a post entitled, Five Great Frenchie Substitutes. I’d heard wonderful things about what comes out of the kitchen and I was hoping to try it one day, but reservations are incredibly hard to come by (hence the need for a list of substitutions). Since Mr French is often out of town and we work late during the week, I rarely get to try places on the other side of town, or anywhere that requires any kind of advance preparation. Reservations are reserved for things like birthdays and three star restaurants.

There are so many great restaurants in Paris, that I’ve never felt deprived, but I am a curious girl and when the opportunity to dine there came up, I didn’t want to say no.

The restaurant is cute, with brick exposed walls and only about 20 place settings. Our reservation was for 19h, a bit early for Paris and I’d had to skip lunch to ensure I’d have an appetite.

It seemed like everyone had a 19h reservation, because a flood of people arrived at once. I was seated next to the toilette and every time someone went in my chair back would take a healthy blow, shoving me into the table’s edge. The waitress spoke perfect French and English, and was very nice about serving in either, or and both. We ordered at the same time as the other tables, were served at the same time as the other tables and were required to leave before 21H30. As a local girl, I found this military precision rather odd and it left me ill at ease through out the meal. There was none of the hustle and bustle of a local bistrot, and with everyone doing approximately the same thing at about the same time, I kind of felt like I was in a school cafeteria.

But I was there to eat and I was not disappointed by what was on my plate. Without taking notes, I remember having enjoyed some excellent smoked sea scallops on sautéed mushrooms with a meyer lemon cream. For the main dish there was a perfectly prepared piece of sea beam and dessert was a blood orange sorbet with slices of fruit and bits of cake. All of this accompanied by a glass of a simply delicious white wine from Greece.

The food was remarkably good. It was light and original; with flavours in foam, lovely textures and the best basic ingredients. And the wine, well after ten years here, I appreciate the opportunity to try non-French wines, this one was well worth being adventurous. I found the portions ridiculously small and as I did a bit of research this evening I found that I am not the only one. The Figaroscope review has a similar complaint, but argues their case with considerably more force.

I love a great meal, but after last night I realized how much I also appreciate a good scene, either fun and lively, or plush and romantic, depending on the soirée. Frenchie is neither and given the rhythm of the orderly service, the tiny portions and the great lengths it takes to get a table, well, I’d probably call a handful of other restaurants first; 21, Racines, Pinxos, La Table d’Aki come to mind.

FRENCHIE

Paris on a snowy day

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vf disponible (et plus tôt drole) en bas de la page

M French was feeling rather romantic, this weekend, playing hookie from the Dali exhibition at the Centre Pompidou and inviting me on a long walk through a snowy Paris.

Obviously, I started at the Flore, where it was easy to get a prime seat, with every table left open for the brave, or the truly addicted (smokers), who all seemed to have stayed in bed. St Sulpice wasn’t far, the lions slumbering peacefully, not at all bothered by the cold.

Actually there seemed to be all kinds of wild beasts out enjoying a little frolick.

We ended our walk Chez Janou, a charming little provencale restaurant with a sunny cuisine that was perfect on a cold winter’s day.

M French m’a invité sur une petite balade romantique, et frigorifiée sous la neige à Paris. Bien évidement, j’ai commencé au Flore où les places étaient plus tôt faciles à trouver, sans trop de compétition pour une vue sur mer. Les fumeurs sont restés au lit. Pas loin, à St Sulpice les lions dormaient, aussi, mais pas les tourists, ni les cyclists!!!

 

En fait, il y avait pas mal de bêtes sauvages à Paris. 

On a terminé notre balade Chez Janou, un petit restaurant provençal avec un charme chalereux, parfait pour une journée hivernale.


 

 

 

 

Parisiennes are fashion

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This Sunday, I headed out my front door, skating across ice capped puddles to see the Impressionism and Fashion exhibition at the Musée d’Orsay. I haven’t seen a lot if expos this year, but I was determined to see this one before its Jan 20 closing.

When I go to a show, its for the art, however as I stroll through room after room, I am also very aware of the curation of the exhibit; what works were chosen? Why? How are they displayed and what story do they tell when presented like this? Have I learned something new about a well known work of art? An artist? A genre? And of course, I hope to learn all of this without taking time to read the explanations, which is incredibly unreasonable and some what lazy of me.

My laziness was richly rewarded by the international team of curators for this event. The show begins with a display of newpaper pages from the 1850’s, announcing the opening of the Galeries du Louvre department store and displaying fashion pages. You then enter a long, narrow hall featuring glass encased ready to wear dresses. There are photos of fashionable Parisians along one walls and paintings on the other, but mostly, you’re shopping. This strategy does a fantastic job of putting Impressionism into the context of its era.

Turn the corner and there is a remarkable quote on the wall,  “La Parisienne n’est pas á la mode, elle est la mode” by A Houssaye and you’re soon in a ball room, chairs lining the walls, each seat labeled with the name of a particular Madame: Monet, Manet, Whistler, all present while larger than life masterpieces of formal ball scenes take center stage.

The next room is a day salon, where the curators flaunt an unbreakable rule and covers the walls with patterned wall paper. In theory this should conflict with the paintings, causing a visual cacophony in reality it enriches the theme of the show, while casting a soft rosy light, perfect for viewing the art. The clothing on display has become haute couture, more finished in rich fabrics that tend to reflect the wardrobes in the artwork.

Many of the painting on display are already part of our visial vocabulary, but seeing it displayed like this forces one to stop and look again. Take notice of Cezanne’s brush stroke, admire Renoir’s use of pink to create a mood and appreciate the stylistic bridge between realism and impressionism in the work of Fantin-Latour.

As you digest all this and prepare for end of the show, there is suddenly grass below your feet and bird song in the air. Parisian park benches line the walls as sumptuously
dressed women with parasols stand tall in oil on canvas. You’re in a French garden. Like the masterpieces that surround you, the show has succeeded in transporting you to another place and time. A masterpiece.

*Parisans are not fashionable, they are fashion.

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