Maastricht

Please don’t ask me how to pronounce the name of this town. I simply can’t no matter how many times I’ve been corrected. But I am not the only one who has a hard time with the place. When I announced we were going to Maastricht, half the French people I know thought we were headed to Belgium, but it is in fact, in Holland. Why would I be going to a town I could not pronounce and very few people ever bother to find it on a map? For art’s sake! For the The European Fine Art Fair, to be precise, or TEFAF, for those in the know, which has been one of premier art shows since 1975.

What exactly is an art fair and what does one do there? Its a one stop shop for serious art buyers and lovers, collection 260 art galleries from 20 countries showing art from every continent except Antarctica. The are 5 main sections to the show, Old Masters, Antiques, Modern Art, Art on Paper and Design (which is a fancy way of say 20th century furniture). Within those sections there is also an area with fine jewelery and a handful of manuscripts and classical antiques (the really old stuff). Nobody seemed to know exactly how large the show was in kilometers, but its like a super mall of really amazing stuff and people flock there, paying the 55€ entrance fee to see truck loads of really rare and beautiful stuff.

Some of those people are billionaires and they are out shopping, vying against museum curators for some key pieces. Others may be passionate collectors who put all their resources into one specific kind of art and there are art students who simply want to learn more, but the vast majority of the people are the same crowd who would head to the Louvre on a Sunday afternoon. Especially this past Sunday, when we heard flocks of Dutch, speaking Dutch. We also heard American and British, some Chinese, lots of French, German and Italian with a bit of Russian for good measure.

Taking a closer look at 2000 yr old gold rings

If you hate museums, this show is probably not for you, but if you like art, its as exciting as being a 7 year old in a candy shop, a 1€ coin in your sweaty palm. Most people probably don’t consider TEFAF because it is out of the way and expensive to attend, but there may be a handful out there who do not go because they are intimidated by the thought of mixing it up with the elite of the art world, so today’s post is all about squashing that inhibition. Because unlike a museum, this place is like an interactive art history lesson, with some of the greatest specialist from the art world absolutely thrilled to share their knowledge and show their art.

Everyone is welcome. If you love art, it is the experience of a lifetime and you really should go. Its an easy train ride from Paris, so day trips are possible if you happen to live in town. The fair is a 30 minute walk, or 10€ taxi ride from the station. When you get there, I recommend spring the 2,50€ for the coat check. The entrance fee, 55€, includes a gorgeous, full color catalogue of the show. It weighs 5 kilos, so I sincerely recommended that you pick it up as you leave at the end of the day.

Getting close to art

Oops!!! Important point, what to wear! There were some outrageous outfits, and a confirmed eccentric, or two, like that crazy Californian chick who lives in Paris, and recently acquired a Bowler hat in London that she absolutely insisted on wearing the first day (to great acclaim, I may add). Most people, however, wear simple nice clothing with the experts insisting on comfortable shoes. I saw very few jeans, and it was warm inside, so sweaters we rare, but beyond that, it was anything goes.

So you’re well dressed, inside the show and ready to go. What now? Prioritize! We spent an entire day visiting just 3 sections. Once you know what you want to see first, start exploring. And here is the important bit, ask questions! The dealers are there to sell, but also to educate and they were happy to talk about their collections and the art world today, even to the obviously starving art a students. Its fascinating what you learn and an absolute thrill when they invite you to feel the canvas of a Caillebotte, hold a 3000 year old piece of pottery, or try on a tiara!

The gallery owners like a bit of fun, too!!!

For lunch, there are a couple of cafés and a “real” restaurant, but we were thrilled with the curry cart we stumbled across on the second day. Lunch for two 11€. After lunch we headed out to see more art and only stopped when they announced the doors were closing in 15 minutes and the booths started closing.

That night we were as exhausted as we had been earlier this month after a day’s skiing. Our minds racing as we digested all we’d seen…. more to come on that tomorrow!!!

 

Scheherazade

An exotic name that evokes love and romance. Somehow I made it through childhood, beyond my teens and into adulthood without ever having read the story of the Princess Scheherazade and the Tales of the 1001 Nights. I knew about Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves, Aladdin and Sinbad the Sailor, but mostly through Disney and Hanna-Barbera, I did not know about the beautiful virgin married off to an evil despot who believe all women were philandering whores. A belief that inspired him to take a bride every morning and have her assassinated before the next sunrise. The vizer’s daughter was horrified to see all these innocent young women loose their lives, and decided to do something about it. She convinced her father to let her be the next bride. He wasn’t thrilled with the idea, but he’s not the first man to find himself firmly wrapped around his daughter’s little finger. And, she assured him, she had a plan.

That night in bed, alone with her king Scheherazade began to spin a tale. A wonderful, enchanting story that had the King completely enthralled. He had to know how it ended, but she fell conveniently asleep before revealing who done it. If the king wanted to know what happened next, he had to spare her life, and he did. This went on for 1001 Nights.

L’Institut du Monde Arabe celebrates Scheherzade with the exhibition LES MILLE ET UNE NUITS that will run until April 28th. Entering the show, I was swept away by the modern version of a flying carpet that hovers about the first room, showing the various editions of the book, from the earliest known example in Arabic (on loan from the University of Chicago, thank you dear daughter) to the decidedly more modern 19th century French translations.

Winding through the exhibition there is a sound area dedicated to the recital of some of the tales, read by French actress and singer Sapho. I slipped on the headphones and was swept away by the seductive poetry of her voice, although the tales themselves are sometimes sad and sometimes violent.

There are more rooms. Some featuring the art from the region, other focusing on the story’s history in film. There are jewelery and costumes, and weapons of war; a totally bizarre foil-wrapped room featuring genies and djinn, as well as some truly exquisite objets d’art. There was a set of Chinese haircombs made of metal and kingfisher feathers that were stunning. Throughout the show, the colors are rich, the materials sumptuous and the subject enthralling, everything you’d expect from a centuries old tale that translates into nearly every culture across the globe.

 

 

 

The debate

London gets a bad rap for being grey and rainy, but Paris does not exactly enjoy tropical highs on a regular basis. In fact, sunny days with bright blue skies are remarkably rare in this part of the world, so when the sun does shine, there is only one place I want to be; outside! Mr French, who works outside the city all week, sees things differently, because while he is happy to see the sunshine, he has exactly 8 days a month in which he is out of the office. After doing a bit of sports, grocery shopping and running errands this does not leave him with much time to take advantage of everything Paris has to offer. Especially not art exhibitions, which is his second favorite hobby after rugby.

So when the sky is bright and the sun is high, we occasionally find ourselves facing a dilemma; he needs his fix for fine art and I stubbornly refuse to pass through a doorway. This is exactly what happened last week as we walked home after a leisurely lunch in the 14th, negotiating a truce debating our options.

The Adams Family!!!

We were so wrapped up in our conversation, we almost didn’t realize that we were in front of the Montparnasse Cemetery. Even though it is a short walk from our front door, I’d never been inside, yet had always wanted to because I’d heard fabulous things about the Pigeon family grave. Trying to change the subject, I suggested we take a detour and quickly found that we’d accidentally stumbled upon our solution!

At the entrance of the cemetery, there is a guard’s booth where they offer free maps. Looking it over the long list of luminaries and celebrities, we were quickly enthralled and insatiably curious. Jean Paul Sartre is buried beside the love of his life Simone de Beauvoir. The poet Baudelaire, the singer/songwriter Serge Gainsbourg, the actress Jean Seberg, and American feminist Susan Sontag all keep one another company.

As we strolled through the grounds, passing families with kids learning to master the tricycle, dapper seniors out for a stroll and the curious, like us, we came across famous names from the literary establishment. Names like the dictionary Larousse, as well as the editors Flammarion and Hachette. And I even found the Adams Family! Something about cemeteries brings out the kid in me. I felt slightly guilty about my laughter over the Penis family headstone, but was unabashed about taking photos of this phallus symbol, I mean really, it’s circumcised, there is no doubt about the sculptor’s intent!!

The cemetery has a surprising number of sculptures by internationally acclaimed artists. There are two works by Niki de Saint Phalle and the Brancusi masterpiece, “Le Baiser”.

It took us a while to find “The Kiss”. Hidden in a remote corner of the cemetery, we kept looking down at the gravestones. Then Mr French had the bright idea of looking up for security cameras, which is when he spotted the statue. Simply breathtaking. We headed towards the exit, but just three tombs down from the work of art we spotted an empty tomb, with a note informing passers by that this lot is available for rent.

 

 

Mr French paused mid-step, “What do you think? We could be buried just steps from Le Baiser. The shadow of a kiss thrown across our tomb for eternity.”

London Art

Despite a previous post, Mr French and I are not big shoppers, spending most of our free time enjoying sports and visiting galleries. This trip was no exception. After our indulgences of Saturday morning, Mr French headed to a 6 Nations rugby match and watched France try (unsuccessfully) to defend its honor against England while I headed to the Tate Modern, one of the greatest art spaces on earth.

Why so great? Because it is free and open to everyone, and everyone comes; men who look like they’ve just left a construction zone, single moms with their broods, large groups of teens hanging out in the large halls and young women dressed for night clubs are all there, surrounded by art.

On my way to the museum, I caught my first glimpse of London’s newest skyscraper, the Shard. Then it was off to the show “A Bigger Splash” about performance art and painting. I wasn’t enthusiastic about the show, but was immediately fascinated by the video of Jackson Pollack painting a painting, with the original masterpiece displayed on the floor of the Tate, just as it was on the floor in the video. Then came a canvas of Yves Klein blue which never fails to dram in until I feel I may drown. There was an intriguing room of hanging mirrors by the Polish artist, Edward Krasinski, a blue line running across the glass, reflecting back and hypnotising visitors. There were also rooms that only enforced my prejudice against performance art, and then show ends with a room of trompe l’oeil stage sets by artist Lucy McKenzie, who then photographs herself in situ. I felt I was collaborating with the artists as I composed shots of visitors in situ in the sets, as well.

 

 

 

I was really at the Tate for the Lichtenstein show, just a few floors up. Organised in collaboration with the Chicago Art Institute, this in-depth retrospective show Lichtenstein’s art in a new light, focusing well beyond his iconic paintings of distraught women in comic book scenarios. We see how he developed his voice, inspired by the Disney books he read his children, and evolved from there, through his work as pop artist and eventually creating lesser known landscapes and abstract work, always using his signature dots and big graphic strokes.

 

The next morning we were both thrilled to head to the National Portrait Gallery to see the photography of Man Ray. Before heading into the exhibit, we stopped by the controversial portrait of Kate Middleton by 65 year old realist painter Paul Emsley. Critics say the painting makes her look old and haggard and a quick peek online confirms what you read. But the artist himself was completely shocked by the negative reviews, responding that perhaps his painting just isn’t photographing well, and he suggests you visit it in the U.K.’s National Portrait Gallery before knocking his work. He has a point, and I recommend you do the same, because in person its ethereally beautiful and undeniably real.

While probably everyone knows that Man Ray was part of the Dada and surrealist art movements, very few realise that he was an American and a frustrated artist who took portraits for magazines and publications to support himself. He did not want to be a photographer, it was simply what he did best. Becoming friends with Marcel Duchamp in New York, he had the perfect introduction to the Paris art world when he arrived in 1921, with access to the lives of Picasso, Gertrude Stein, Dali and his muse, Kiki de Montparnasse. Always curious, he experimented with different techniques, inventing the solarization process with his model, muse and lover Lee Miller. The photos would be impressive enough if each one did not have an intrigue tale and a bit of history attached, but they do, and I spent hours studying each piece, reveling in each story. An art and a history lesson all in one.

The other Cartier

                                           Chez Mondrian, by André Kertész

Because the subjunctive isn’t confusing enough, there is the question of French names. They are not the most creative with names, which means anytime a single girlfriend of mine meets a new Frenchman, we ask her, “So, its Jean-who?” It may be Jean Marc, Jean Phillip, or Jean Jacques, but chances are high that there is a Jean somewhere in there.

This gets even more confusing when it spills over to the naming of institutions. Take, for instance, the Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson. Even the locals get confused and very few people know that this little gem of an exhibition space even exists. Mostly because, it is just a few blocks away from the large, glass encased Fondation Cartier, the monumental, contemporary art space sponsored by the internationally renowned jeweler.

Recently, my friend Kate of Mais Oui Paris was in town and raving about the Howard Greenberg exhibit at the Fondation Cartier-Bresson, so I thought it was time to discover the space. The next Saturday was cold an dreary. I prodded Mr French out of bed and we were off.

Founded by Cartier-Bresson, his wife Martine Franck and their daughter in 2003, and situated in an Impasse in the 14th, this beautifully airy, Art Nouveau building boasts an interior space of that is all about light, as it should be for a photographer. The galleries themselves are out of the light, both protecting the photos and showing them in the medium grey the photographer had in mind as he developed each print. There are three floors, each with one small gallery.

Presently, the Foundation is hosting the Howard Greenberg collection. Greenberg is a New Yorker who started out as a gallery owner at Woodstock, and soon found himself collecting mid-century American photography. Owning a gallery gave him access to some of the masterpieces of our time, making for an astounding collection of contemporary icons.

Do you recall an image of about half a dozen construction workers lunching on a steel beam, hanging in midair above the New York skyline? The photo is in the show. The Dorothea Lange photo of a migrant working mother during the Depression is there, too. The Hungarians, Kertész and Capa are represented beside American greats like Walker Evans and Irving Penn.

View of Notre Dame, by Henri Cartier-Bresson

Beyond admiring one perfectly balanced, or intentional imbalanced, photo after another, I was impressed by how many women photographers were represented; Ruth Orkin, Lisette Model, Margaret Burke-White are just some of the women I uncovered during our visit. This is remarkably rare in a world dominated by, well, men.

As you climb to the third, and final floor you arrive in a loft space that is flooded with light. Here is a permanent collection of Cartier Bresson’s work, with a living room set-up for reviewing various photography books. If you speak French, art historians, critics, curators, and famous photographers come to this intimate space to give free lectures to anyone wanting to attend. The next lecture is Feb 20 at 18h30, with Agnès Varda. Guess where I’ll be next Wednesday night?

Street Art

There is a fine line between Street Art and vandalism, and I really have no idea where to draw it, but for most of us, we know it when we see it and this weekend we saw a good share of it at the Musée de la Poste (the Post Office Museum), just up the street from chez nous.

Small and not exactly known for exciting exhibitions, very few people know where the Musée de la Poste actually is. I know exactly where it is because it is less than half a block from my favorite crèperie, Ty Breizh, in the shadow of the Tour Montparnasse on the boul de Vaugirard.

“There is no boul de Vaugirard!!!” exclaimed Mr French, its “rue de Vaugirard!!!”

Lets just say, that it took us 20 minutes for a 5 minute walk. But getting lost in Paris has its rewards; we discovered a very high end stereo store perfect for Mr French  and stumbled upon a great looking restaurant, Le Quinze, that features sustainable fish. We’ll be trying it just as soon as I am eating again (Detox. More on that tomorrow).

Before we knew it, we were at the museum and enthralled with the art. The collection was surprisingly international with some of the best graffiti artists today. There were the accidentally counterfeit bills by Banksy. Space Invaders done in Rubik’s cubes, pochette paintings by Mis.Tic and lots of videos to see the stars at work. The show is short, just one large room and the crowd was refreshingly manageable for Paris. Even Em, who hadn’t been particularly thrilled about getting out of bed on a Saturday morning, loved it and the videos were so well done that I stopped to watch them, which really doesn’t happen often. What is known to happen often is that embarrassing moment when I burst out into a spontaneous guffaw of laughter. This was a two guffaw show.

Between my gourmandise and the morning’s detour, it wouldn’t shock you to hear that we then headed to my crèperie. Lent is coming up so the Ty Breizh was full of families in a festive mood, on addition to the usual lot of travelers who come for a treat before catching their train and Japanese tourists. I don’t know why it is, but this crèperie is in alot of Japanese guidebooks.

Sat am, and we’d already gotten lost, seen some great art and had delicious treat. I was looking forward to what the rest of the day had in store for us!!!

The World’s Origins

It’s art, I get that and I am major fan. Yet, I was still kind of surprised this morning when I went to Le Figaro’s front page and saw a rather large, extremely clear photo of The Origins of the World painting by Courbet. Yes, I started my morning looking into the vagina of a stranger (shown below).

Now, I am not a prude. I’ve seen The Vagina Monologues, have a frequent buyer card at Good Vibrations in San Francisco and I am regularly called upon by friends looking for fresh new ideas for tips and tricks in the bedroom. But the painting is graphic and it was what I’d call a rude awakening.

Through my morning fog, I first thought I was staring at a photo set up to look like the painting. The work is definitely a sample of the realism school of art. Fortunately, I didn’t spit out my Prince Vladimir, Kusmi tea in surprise, but rather clicked through to learn more.

It turns out that this internationally acclaimed painting is only half a painting and that the artist originally included a head. Earlier this month, French art expert Jean Jacques Fernier declared the head of the young lady had been found. Or rather, the painting of the head had been found. Not the actual head, which I am not sure is even missing. Unlike Richard III’s, which did pop up rather recently.

According to Le Figaro’s expert, Hubert Duchemin, the entire story is pure nonsense and “even a two year old” could see that the portrait of Jo, the beautiful Irish girl that was Courbet’s muse and Whistler’s lover, did not come off the same brush as the rest of the painting regions. It makes for a great story; 19th century love, sex and porn tied to a potential multi-million€ windfall as two experts fight it out for international prominence.

The question remains, how did Le Figaro decide society was ready to see this photo splashed across the front page? I am not the only one who finds it pornographic. When someone used the painting as his FaceBook profile photo in 2011, the company suspended his account. A book with this image as cover art was not allowed to be displayed in the windows of bookstores in France in 1994, nor in Portugal in 2009. The painting was shown at an exhibit in Paris in 2005, and although the entire room was a collection of sexually graphic sketches and illustrations, this particular painting was in an isolated area you had to go out of your way to enter.

The cover of Paris Match features the same painting, but type covers the most intimate details, making it infinitely less surprising. On one hand, I am all for the open exhibition of anatomy, on the other hand, I know that the allusion can be sexier than the reality and I wonder if seeing penis and vaginas on public display, spread across newsstands may not detract a bit from the magic and the mystery of sex.

I can’t wait to hear what you think….

I want my Dali….

If Hopper was a great artist, Dali was pure genius. It is not really fair to compare, but we enjoyed a double header last week, seeing Hopper late Saturday evening and Dali first thing Sunday morning, so I can’t help myself.

Sunday was our third attempt at seeing the show, every time we’d tried to see it previously the lines, even for ticket holders and members, had been outrageously long. A sign outside suggests visitors arrive after 6pm, or face the three hour long waits that are common earlier.

I’d read that on Sundays the museum opens at 11am, but the Dali show was open to members and ticket holders starting at 9am. We arrived at 9h20 and despite the pouring rain, the line already crossed the entire square. It moved quickly, giving us just enough time to enjoy the hot coffees Mr French scored us from a nearby café.

The show begins in an igloo shaped structure that reminded me of Dali’s home in Cadaques. The walls looked like white stucco and a docent was explaining to her group that usually there was an image of the artist in an egg projected on the walls. Unfortunately the A/V expert had over-slept and there were no videos that morning.

This show, like the Hopper show, presents the artist’s work chronologically and what is so striking with this show is the realization that Dali never had to find his voice. He was painting lobsters from the very beginning and even if some of his earliest work was realist, his palette, his line and his landscapes were all there, just as we know them from his iconic works of melting clocks and distorted elephants.

The result is that you step immediately into the world of Dali and start to develop the vaguest sense of his mind. If you read the signs, you’ll learn that as a young child he became obsessed with the idea that the two farmers stopped for prayer in Millet’s Angelus were actually praying over the body of the child, their child, they had just killed. The obsession stuck with him his entire life, clearly visible throughout his art and at one point he even convinced the Louvre to take his idea seriously and investigate the painting itself. Which shows that not only did Salvador have a very active imagination, but he took that imagination, and himself very seriously.

This is another very popular show and it is over crowd, with people waiting in line patiently to see each painting. After two or three rooms, this got rather tiresome, but at about the same time, the show goes multi-media. There is a fantastic theater with white plastic versions Dali’s famous lip couch, brightly lit, welcoming spectators to watch…

watch what? I had no idea because the screen was white. The guard just outside the door explained that the A/V person had never shown up and there would be no videos for the morning. 5 minutes later a voice came on over the loud speakers announcing that “Due to technically difficulties, the A/V system would up and running within the hour.” Technical difficulty must be the new term for hang over.

Regardless, the A/V system was running within 10 minutes, which game me just enough time to discover Dali’s 3D paintings, which are displayed with mirrors to get the full 3D effect. And then the real fun began. There is his Mae West room, which is decorated just as Dali specified, then projected against the wall, so you can photograph yourself, a bit of art within the art and a great souvenir!

There were also video clips of Dali being Dali. Some of it was in French, some I couldn’t hear and most of it, well it really didn’t matter, because the visuals were enough. Dali, signing a rock at Cadaques, Dali sponsoring a trendy party in the 70’s, giving everyone cotton candy, Dali explaining Alka Seltzer.

The videos were so good I went back to see if the film was running. It was and it was pretty funny. He talks about his famous Venus de Milo dresser with all those drawers, explaining that they are the drawers in which we compartmentalize ourselves according to Freud. And he poses his wife Gala, as he explains the American obsession for blood (its in all their movies), his melting watches (they’re so rushed, they love the idea of time melting away), and massacring children (every American’s secret fantasy, don’t you know?).

The exhibition is an inspiring orchestration of life imitating art, creating an experience that was truly surreal.

Hopper

                                                                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.

Advent -2

After photography, there is graffiti…A few years ago I was on the look out for a very unique, incredibly personal gift idea for Mr French when I came across a post by AnnetteC on Our Paris Forum. Annette, who has a sweet little flat in the 5th that she rents to tourists (there is a gift idea… a flat in Paris), had recently created an utterly memorable terribly romantique gift for her hubby, a bit of street art. I LOVED the idea and wrote if she minded if I did a little copycat. She didn’t mind and I started purring….

While strolling the streets of Paris, Annette had become curious about the street art of the artist Gregos. Gregos creates faces that look like someone is walking through a wall on to the city’s streets. There are three moulds of the face, but each face is individually painted and Gregos welcomes collaborations by other artists. Artists like me, or YOU!!!

For 30€ you can order a plaster of Paris (I know, ironic, hunh?) face from Gregos‘ website. You then paint the face with an idea, theme or inspiration especially for your giftee. Once painted the face is ready to be gifted or have Gregos stick it on a Paris street. He’ll even tell you how you can put it on the streets of YOUR (or the giftee’s) hometown!!!

Not only did Mr French love his mask, but I absolutely loved the expression on his face as we strolled by the Luxembourg Gardens and he noticed a very cool face coming out of the wall, then realized it was dedicated to him. It was another week or so before he understood that I had not just commissioned the face, but that I was actually the artist behind the art. And every time we we’re in the neighborhood, he wants to stroll by, just to check out his face.

The faces truly are art, which makes them collectables, which means they may be stolen. For Mr French I purchased two, had one put up on a wall in his beloved 5th arrondisement and kept the other one for our balcony at home. Which turned out to be a good thing, because after three years, his face was stolen sometime this summer!

Not an artist? Gregos is and you can buy one of his painted faces (135€) on his website. With the Gregos face, you’re supporting the arts, while giving the gift of art, a gift you’re sure will not be one of three identical gifts. If you’re looking for something fun and funky that doesn’t cost more than a tongue and cheek, this is the gift you’ve been looking for…

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