Skip to content

Posts from the ‘Art’ Category

Jul 6

8 Comments

No. 298: Eiffel’s Café Chair Tower

eiffel=tower-red-chairs.jpgIf you have been following my final 365-days in France, you know that I am mad for the Eiffel Tower and anything Eiffel inspired. For the past few weeks, we have been seeing double on the Champ de Mars, so I have been doubly happy…well it also helps that we have come to the end of five-weeks of back-to-back visitors, but that’s another story…

Even if I wasn’t overjoyed by the chance to reclaim our apartment, I would still be tickled pink (or crimson) by the two Eiffel Towers gracing the park en ce moment. A French company has temporarily set up a 40-foot red Eiffel Tower made from 324 café chairs to celebrate the upcoming 125th anniversary of Gustave’s most famous landmark.

eiffel-tower-red-chairs2.jpg

The fire engine-red sculpture will only be on the Champ de Mars until tomorrow afternoon, although rumor has it, it is being secretly transferred to an undisclosed location somewhere else in the City of Light. Stay tuned.

Jun 30

5 Comments

No. 294: Festival du Cinéma Américain de Deauville

Deauville_France_Cabanas_American_movie-Stars.jpg

Moseying along the red ironwood boardwalk today, I finally decided to look up why the beach cabins lining the walkway are named after American actors and directors. What I discovered is that each cabana is named for an American cinema icon who has attended the resort’s Festival du Cinéma Américain de Deauville.

The festival began in the mid-1970s and was first created to “prolong the summer and illuminate the boardwalk with starlight…”

According to the festival’s website, which could use a bit of English editing…the Deauville American Cinema Festival has been the ephemeral site where young and rising American directors are discovered and acknowledged. A space for films where dreams come to life, nurturing the coalescence of the collective imagination linked to the greatest cinematography in the world: yesterday’s, today’s and tomorrow’s projected on the big screen; a whole industry and its stars and its legends. This is the America of the cinema: this is American Cinema.

This year is the 40th anniversary of the festival and, boy howdy, I would love to go. It is the only film festival in the world that offers the general film-loving public 10-day, 24/24 access to every film screened.

Hmm…I feel a girls’ week brewing!

Book your pass here.

14-05-19-UPDATE_SLIDER-40

 

Jun 30

5 Comments

No. 293: Un Homme et une Femme

The wide golden seashore in Deauville plays a leading role in Un Homme et une Femme, the 1966 French film by Claude Lelouch that won nearly 50 international awards (including the Palme d’Or at Cannes and the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film). It also led to decades of romantic road trips and rendezvous to this famous seaside town. While strolling along the storied boardwalk last evening, I came across this plaque, and was reminded that I needed to rewatch this classic romance with the impossibly gorgeous and very French Anouk Aimée.

deauville_un_homme_et_une_fille.jpg

If you haven’t seen the film, I am sure your subconscious is familiar with the ba-da-ba-da-da-da-da-da-da-ba-da-ba song by Francis Lai and Pierre Barouh which nips in and out of scenes throughout the film.

If you have seen it, as most good Francophiles have, you will remember that much of the film is told wordlessly through either very dramatic action, or through hearing the characters’ thoughts as they talk themselves through life. Watching it again this morning, it was hard not to giggle and I still haven’t shaken the da-ba-da-ba-das from my brain. If you need to swoon and grin and want a groovy soundtrack to carry your day, take a look at this celebrated beach scene from the strands of romantic Deauville. Bonne séance!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YdFBAsMo61c

 

 

 

Jun 30

2 Comments

No. 291: Boudin and Monet in Trouville

Mentor and student and life-long friends Eugène Boudin and Claude Monet captured holidaymakers and the extreme weather on the beaches of Trouville during the late 1800s. Monet honeymooned in the town with his beloved Camille and his snapshot paintings painted en plein air have grains of sand from the windswept beach mixed in.

Jun 5

8 Comments

No. 269: James Thiérrée

My creative coiffeur just turned me on to James Thiérrée: part clown, poet trapeze artist, violinists, magician, mime and astonishing contemporary dancer and choreographer. The son of circus performers Victoria Chaplin and Jean-Baptiste Thiérrée and the grandson of Charlie Chaplin, and great-grandson of Eugene O’Neill, the apple certainly hasn’t fallen far from the tree. I adore this type of theatre.

Take a look and tell me what you think.

 

 

Jun 4

16 Comments

No. 264-268: Burano, Murano, Gondolas, Street Lights, and Masks

In another moment of cheekiness, I feel inclined to post about somewhere other than France this morning. I justify these infrequent and random posts secure in the knowledge that if I wasn’t living in France, there is no way I would have the opportunity to so easily and cheaply leave la belle France and explore other parts of Europe. The ability to make these trips from the bustling hub of my hometown Paris is yet another thing I love about France.

Donc here are a few colorful memories from an inspiring quick trip to Venice. While Superman was busy discussing green growth and climate change with graduate students in a city which is 18 inches or so from being wiped out by sea level rise, I was strolling through the back streets of Venice and visiting the islands beyond while they are still here.

masks-Venice2.jpg

May 31

4 Comments

No. 263: Monet in Venice

I was extremely fortunate to accompany Superman on a work trip to Venice, the City of Changing Light. A painter’s and photographer’s dream.

venice_2014.jpg

 

monet_venice3.jpgmonet_venice2.jpg

monetvenice

 

« Older Entries
Newer Entries »