For centuries until the French Revolution, the extension and beautification of Paris was largely a royal affair. Among the last major urban developments in the capital before titles and heads would fall was Place Louis XV, now called Place de la Concorde, Paris’s largest square, a nearly 20-acre zone between the Tuileries Garden and the Champs-Elysées.

In 1793, both Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette would know the sharp edge of the guillotine on the square (renamed Place de la Révolution for the occasion), but 30 years earlier the Sixteenth’s predecessor and grandfather, Louis XV, arrived of his own free will to bask in royal veneration as he inaugurated a bronze equestrian statue in his honor. Facing the splendid royal city with calm strength and crowned with laurel leaves, the statue was the focal point around which western Paris would develop, beginning with this very square where two monumental palaces were then under construction.

Ange-Jacques Gabriel, the star architect of the day, had been commissioned to create identical Neoclassical palaces to adorn the northern flank of the new square. These enormously expensive buildings, called hôtels in French, were not exactly purpose-built, beyond the purpose of creating an impressive backdrop for the aforesaid statue. (In French, a hôtel, in addition to designating a place of lodging, refers to a town house or city mansion or administrative building.)

The western building became a private residence. It is now partly occupied by the luxury hotel Le Crillon and the Automobile Club of France. Meanwhile, the eastern building was consigned in 1765 to the Garde-Meuble de la Couronne, an institution tasked with furnishing and maintaining the furnishings of royal palaces (Versailles, Compiègne, Fontainebleau, Rambouillet, Saint-Germain-en-Laye and others.) Think of it as the royal furniture storehouse, though it stored and ordered more than furniture. From beds and chairs to bronze clock, crown jewels, fancy firearms and linens, the Garde-Meuble oversaw the ordering and storage of all manner of decorative elements. Its head administrator or intendant was in contact with the major craftsmen and designers of the era, along with a substantial budget. (The Garde-Meuble is ancestor to the Mobilier National, which currently maintains and restores furnishings, ancient and contemporary, for official use by the State.)

Alas, it wasn’t exactly a secure location for national treasures: revolutionaries raided the royal arms collections on July 13, 1789 before heading to the Bastille the following day, and the crown jewels were stolen in 1792. But eventually there was enough calm in the air to optimistically rebaptize the square on which it stood Place de la Concorde.

The French Naval Command began to use a portion of the Garde-Meuble during the Revolution, and by the of the 18th century it had taken over the entire premises, leading the building to be called Hôtel de la Marine. The Navy continued to occupy the building until 2015, when the military consolidated its branches in a new location in southern Paris. The destiny of the Hôtel de la Marine was then up for grabs.

There was no shortage of ideas on how to re-purpose this glorious chunk of central Paris real estate. What re-opened in June 2021, after four years of renovation, is a hybrid solution: a museum dedicated to the building’s first mission as the royal garde-meuble and its second as navy headquarters; an upscale café; a formal restaurant; a giftshop; an art gallery; the headquarters for two foundations, and several floors of co-working rental space.

Despite its name, the museum in the Hôtel de la Marine is not a pendant to the Museum of the Army at the Invalides. While there are traces of the naval presence—a gallery of “war ports” endowed by Napoleon III, the anchor motifs on ceiling fixtures—along with a tactile display telling about famous French marine officers and explorers, the dozen rooms, large and small, that can be visited largely refer to the building’s initial function as a décor storehouse.

There were only two intendants of the Garde-Meuble over the Louis XV-Louis XVI period that the institution was headquartered here: the intellectual, libertine Pierre-Elisabeth de Fontanieu (from 1772 to 1784) and the more conventional and less imaginative Marc-Antoine Thierry de Ville-d’Avray (from 1784 to 1789), the latter killed during the Revolution. Both left their mark on their private apartments, which were royally furnished and located above the ground-floor storerooms. Painstakingly restored, the human-size living space and offices occupied by these two upper-management bureaucrats are the primary rooms that one visits here while wearing a well-fitting headset through which you learn about their lives and times, major historical events and especially the décor.

Visitors can crab-walk through the narrow, mirrored love-nest created by Fontanieu (though the erotica was later replaced with playful cherubs) and the airy, ostentatious bedrooms later created for Ville-d’Avray and his wife. Electric “candlelight” adds to the charm of these rooms, though the electric cords drooping from the faux candles refutes some of that charm.

The necessary and instructive audio tour is upbeat enough to engage the listener, while the rooms themselves are presented as though still occupied: the dining room table is littered with oyster shells, as it would be after an intimate, upper-class dinner; the gaming tables are cluttered with cards and betting tokens, and the office desks are swamped by paperwork, ledgers and teacups. Beyond the living quarters, the eye is further treated to the gilt decorative work and large chandeliers of galleries subsequently used as ballrooms by Napoleon I, Charles X and Napoleon III, given life during the tour through video recreations of dances past.

This slice-of-life scenery is possible only after years of treasure hunts for authentic furnishings and period fabrics. Curators and private donors have scooped up past inventory at private auctions. The dining room furniture appropriated by former president Giscard d’Estaing has been returned from the Elysée Palace by President Emmanuel Macron. Visitors from Boston may recognize the Ville-d’Avray bedroom furniture since some of the original furnishings are now in their local museum. WWII buffs will note in that bedroom the hole in the inner shutter that was made by the German occupiers (the German Navy commandeered the building from 1940 to 1944) to watch out for the arrival of liberating forces on Rue de Rivoli in August 1944.

Toward the end of the visit one steps out onto the terrace behind the building’s signature colonnade for a panoramic view of Place de la Concorde and monuments beyond it: the Grand Palais, the Eiffel Tower, the National Assembly, the dome of the Invalides, the greenery of the Tuileries Garden—a view that’s nearly worth the price of admission itself.

Because, yes, there is a cost to this decorative time travel: 13€ for the 45-minute Salon & Loggia tour (with headset) that gives access to the ceremonial rooms and the panoramic view or 17€ for a 90-minute Grand Tour (with headset) which additionally includes the living quarters and private offices, a dozen rooms in all. (Free for visitors under 25.) The indicated times are those of the full audio (available in English) but you aren’t required to stay in each room to examine each decorative item. Seventy minutes or so is a more likely time for the Grand Tour.

Given the choice, we suggest springing for the Grand Tour, in which you have a choice between the following themes: The Age of Enlightenment (i.e. the 18th century), Traveling through Time, and two Family themes, one for adults and one for children. Unless visiting with children (who may find the museum a yawn anyway) and unless you’re particularly interested in 18th history and decorative arts, choose Travelling through Time, which nevertheless gives plenty of information about the 18th century and the décor. Timed reservations are mandatory and help avoid over-crowding of the smaller rooms.

While the colonnade of the Hôtel de la Marine has for 250 years been part of the Parisian landscape, the possibility for the public to now go inside for a view of its splendor is a welcome addition to the city’s museumscape.

The caféscape of Paris also benefits from the opening of Café Lapérouse, named for an 18th-century marine officer and explorer (and a famous restaurant across the river). It’s a fine, chic and pricey port to weigh anchor at any time of day, whether for a morning croissant (3€) or a lobster salad sandwich (35€) or a croque-monsieur (24€) or a late afternoon drink. A ticket to the museum isn’t necessary to enter the café, the courtyard or the gift shop.

The formal restaurant, La Mimosa, directed by multi-starred chef Jean-François Piège, will open in September. According to advance press, it will have a Southern-French influence and France’s first devilled egg bar.

The State’s Centre des Monuments Nationaux, which operates the building, has also made a 20-year deal with the Qatari Al Thani family to present its art collection in the Hôtel de la Marine. The inaugural show will open in the fall.

Hôtel de la Marine, 2 place de la Concorde, 8th arrondissement. Metro: Concorde. Open daily 10:30 am – 7:00 pm; Fridays until 10 pm.

© 2021, Corinne LaBalme and Gary Lee Kraut.

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With the reopening this month of the Villa Majorelle, Nancy reaffirms its attraction as a destination for visitors who delight in the floral- and nature-inspired curves, the flowing design and the craftsmanship of the Art Nouveau period.

The villa is an iconic home of the Art Nouveau style that flourished in Nancy at the turn of the 20th century. It was the home of Louis Majorelle, a cabinetmaker and furniture manufacturer, whose company, originally focused on the production of copies of older styles, became increasingly involved in the creation of modern furniture inspired by forms in nature and influenced by the work of Emile Gallé, Nancy’s celebrated glass designer.

Gallé and Majorelle were among the founders of the Nancy School of design. An important collection of their works and of their contemporaries from 1890 to 1914 can be found at the Musée de l’Ecole de Nancy, the Museum of the Nancy School, the city’s primary Art Nouveau destination, a 15-minute walk from the Villa Majorelle. (Several examples of Majorelle furniture can be seen in the decorative arts section of the Orsay Museum in Paris.)

The Villa Majorelle—originally known as the Villa Jika, after the initials for Majorelle’s wife, Jane Kretz—was built 1901-1902 and holds a special place in the history of architecture in Nancy. It is considered the first completely Art Nouveau house in the city, designed as an ensemble in which each component of its structure and decoration was designed in close interdependence with the rest of the building. The flowing forms and decorative motifs and the continuous interplay between the exterior and the interior make Villa Majorelle an example of successfully applying the notion of artistic unity, advocated by a large number of artists of the period.

The villa was the first major commission for Henri Sauvage (1873-1932), a young, unknown architect when he received it in 1898. Sauvage, who would go on to design significant projects in Paris, would later say, “I worked there for two years, redesigning my work a hundred times over… I offer this, my first client, this fine artist (…) the expression of my heartfelt gratitude for the unheard-of freedom that he gave me. Despite my young age, he never imposed a budget limitation nor his personal ideas on me.”

Sauvage took care of the fixed decoration, which included the ironwork, and called in other artists for specific tasks. His Parisian friends, the ceramic artist Alexandre Bigot and the painter Francis Jourdain, respectively created the flambé stoneware exteriors and interiors and the decorative paintings in the dining room. Louis Majorelle himself designed the furniture, some of which was already to be found in his sales catalogues. Nancy’s master glazier, Jacques Gruber, was given the task of designing the stained-glass windows in the main rooms (stairwell, dining room, living room and the master bedroom). The concrete structural works were carried out by the construction company France-Lanord et Bichaton. Experts have found that the finished ensemble shows the occasional error, such as the north exposure of the terrace, the reusing of materials and money-saving choices, but above all Villa Majorelle stands out as a unique experimental work.

After completing the Majorelle project, Henri Sauvage largely pursued his career in Paris over the next 30 years. His Paris work more particularly expresses the Art Deco aesthetic that took over in the 1920s. Most visible to Parisians and visitors alike is his reconstruction and expansion of the department store Samaritaine, which in 2020 is emerging from years of restoration and renovation as a luxury destination in its own right.

Majorelle’s company suffered during the First World War, and after his death in 1926 his son Jacques sold the property. It has been owned by the City of Nancy since 2003. While the original property surrounding the Villa Majorelle has been subdivided over the years, the house has been restored very much as it was designed by Sauvage and with many of the original decorative elements created by Majorelle and his contemporaries.

The Musée de l’Ecole de Nancy has been tasked with overseeing oversees the Villa Majorelle. Using original photographs from the lifetime of Louis Majorelle (a photo album that belonged to his son), furnishing and decorative works have been purchased and placed according to Majorelle’s sense of aesthetics. (Older photos illustrating this text come from that photo album, which is held by the museum.)

Restoration of the villa’s exterior began in 2017 and work will continue on portions of the interior through 2022. The Villa Majorelle will remain open throughout that period.

Villa Majorelle, 1 rue Louis Majorelle. Open Wed.-Sun. 9am-noon for groups, 2-6pm for individuals. 6€; 8€ with joint ticket for the Musée de l’Ecole de Nancy (Museum of the Nancy School) when used the same day. The museum, 36-38 rue du Sergent Blandan, is open Wed.-Sun. 10am-6pm.

Nancy’s notable Musée des Beaux-Arts (Fine Arts Museum) includes a presentation of several hundred pieces from the Daum glassworks of Nancy, among them significant pieces from the Art Nouveau period.

Art Nouveau walks in Nancy: A number of Art Nouveau buildings can be seen on a walk between the Nancy train station and Place Stanislas, the elegant 18th-century main square of the city, as well as elsewhere in the city. See, for example, the Excelsior Brasserie, created in 1911, just two blocks from the station. A downloadable brochure from the Nancy Tourist Office outline Art Nouveau walks in the city.

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Slavery is a crime against humanity. So decreed France in 2001, making it the first country to do so. What may seem to be a solely symbolic decree, akin to declaring the Jurassic era over, is actually a way of condemning the country’s own history with respect to slavery, something not every country is willing to do.

The law was adopted by Parliament on May 10, which was then decreed the National Day of Commemoration with respect to slavery. In particular, it recognizes France’s involvement in slavery and the slave trade for over 350 years until the definitive abolition of slavery in France and its colonies on law April 27, 1848. The abolition law, passed under the period known as the Second Republic, resulted in the liberation of 250,000 people from slavery.

Slavery had been outlawed in continental France since 1315, but with conquest of the Americas and European incursions into black Africa, France by the early 16th century become a full partner in the triangular slave trade between Africa, Europe and the Americas. Estimates vary as to the total number of Africans uprooted and enslaved in the Americas with European involvement (primarily Portugal, Spain, England, Holland, France) from the 15th to the 19th centuries, with 12-15 million Africans being the figure used along the Route. (Black slavery to countries north of the Sahara was long present, if on a much smaller scale, before Europeans arrived.)

While men, women and children were not brought as slaves to the transcontinental ports of Nantes and Bordeaux, certain French shipping companies actively participated in their transport and profited from slavery in the colonies.

Origins of the Abolition of Slavery Route

In the wake of the national decree declaring slavery and the slave trade crimes against humanity, a number of sites in eastern France and in Switzerland joined together in a thematic constellation under the heading the Abolition of Slavery Route.

Launched in 2004 with support from the UN and UNESCO, the Abolition of Slavery Route appears as a haphazard route on the map. Unlike other historic routes in France (e.g. wine, pastel, castle, abbey, Impressionists or Napoleon routes), there is no true unity of place to these sites , though historically the anti-slavery movement in France did develop in its eastern provinces and their connection with Switzerland.

Burgundy – Franche-Comté

Rare is the traveler who will actually follow the route from start to finish. This article concerns three sites on that route in Burgundy – Franche-Comté, a composite administrative region, comprised of evocative Burgundy on for its west portion and little-known Franche-Comté for its east portion. While the thirsty traveler will know of Burgundy first through wine, hungry traveler might initially encounter Franche-Comté through comté, which is among the most familiar raw-milk (cow) hard-pressed cheeses in France, and through poulet de Bresse, which is among the country’s top-quality chickens.

Each of the three major sites in Burgundy – Franche-Comté honor abolition presents a different facet of efforts between 1789 and 1848 to abolish slavery .

The House of Negritude and Human Rights

While the year 1848 marks France’s complete refusal of slavery in its territories, it was in the 1780s that significant anti-slavery movements began making their voices heard in France, as well as in Great Britain and the United States. On March 19, 1789, four months before the storming of the Bastille, citizens in the village of Champagney (Haute-Saône) drew up a charter of grievances (photo above) in which they wrote to King Louis XVI, “The inhabitants and community of Champagney cannot think of the ills being suffered by Negroes in the colonies, (…) without feeling a stabbing pain in their hearts.”

That expression of solidarity earns Champagney its place on the Abolition of Slavery Route. Here, in what is now a small town with a population of 3600, the House of Negritude and Human Rights (La Maison de la Negritude et des Droits de l’Homme) presents a reproduction of a slave ship and numerous African and Haitian objects that illustrate negritude (or the values of black civilizations around the world).

Château de Joux, the fortress prison of Toussaint Louverture

During the French Revolution, in 1792, the National Assembly granted full rights of citizenship to people of color. As early as 1794, the young republic appeared to be on its way to definitively abolishing slavery in its colonies when it promulgated a law to that effect. (It was at around this period that the term “crime against humanity” was first used.) However, that early French version of our Emancipation Proclamation wasn’t fully applied in all of France’s overseas territories in the ensuing years, and Napoleon Bonaparte, in his pre-Emperor role of First Consul, turned the country’s back on that decree. In 1802 he reinstate the legality of black slavery and the slave trade in colonies where former slaves weren’t yet all free.

Shortly thereafter, Toussaint Louverture (~1743-1803), an Afro-Caribbean who had become governor of the island of Santo Domingo (present day Haiti) and leader of the rebellion against French rule at the time Bonaparte’s decree, was jailed and brought to the continent to be imprisoned in the Chateau de Joux. Louverture was born into slavery, was a freed and become a slave-owner himself in his 30s before climbing the military and political ladder through alliances with various sides over through the 1790s. The fortress at La Cluse et Mijoux (Doubs), which served as a state prison from 1690 to 1815, stands on the summit of a 3300-foot rocky outcrop guarding the entry to the water gap that is a natural passageway into Switzerland.

Louverture died a few months after his incarceration here. In 1804, within a year of his death, Haiti became a sovereign country, though bloodshed on the island would continue. His cell, situated on the ground floor of the fortress dungeon, can be visited (see photo at top of article).

The Anne-Marie Javouhey House

The same revolutionary body that would free slaves was also wary of the desire of the Catholic Church to reassert its dominance in the lives of the citizens of France. Born in Chamblanc in 1779, Anne-Marie Javouhey therefore grew into the faith of her ancestors in relative secrecy during her teenage years before taking her vows. Religious, as well as racial, reasons had often been given for allowing slavery from Africa. For Sister Javouhey and others, however, religion was instead a reason to oppose slavery, and former slaves should be converted to Christianity.

In 1805 she founded a religious congregation that would eventually take on the name Saint Joseph de Cluny, with a particular interest in education. The order, which still exists, became the first order of female missionaries. Beginning in 1817 and periodically for the next 25 years, Javouhey personally led a group of sisters on missions around the world, where they bore witness to the black slave trade. “Negroes are not deaf to the voice of morality nor to that of civilization,” she wrote to the governor of Guyana; “children of God, they are men just like us.” In 1835 Javouhey and her group obtained the right to oversee the education and conversion of 500 slaves. The first emancipations came in 1838 when she obtained the freedom of 149 who had been shipped to Mana, Guyana. Others would follow.

In addition to the family home of Anne-Marie Javouhey and a museum space located in the school that currently bears her name, the Abolition of Slavery Route sites in Chamblanc (Côte d’Or) include a remembrance forest, made up of 150 trees each named after one of the first freed African slaves.

Further information

The route continues in northeastern France and into Switzerland. For further information in French about the Abolitions of Slavery Route see its official website. The official tourism website of the Burgundy-Franche-Comté region can be found here in English. 

Lodging 

Near La Cluse et Mijoux (Château de Joux): The town of Pontarlier,  several miles to one side of the fortress, has the 3-star Hotel Saint-Pierre and the B&B La Maison d’A Côté. Several miles to the other side and a half-mile from the Swiss border, Le Tillau is a chalet-like 11-room hotel and restaurant in the Jura Mountains.

Champagney: By Napoleon’s time already Champagney was known for its coal mines rather than for its point of view on slavery. The mid-19th-century manor of the director of coal mines in the area (which closed in 1958) is now the B&B Château de la Houillère. Just outside of Champagney, in the village of Ronchamp, the B&B La Maison du Parc also occupies a charming 19th-century mansion.

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When it fully reopens at the end of 2020 upon completion of a 5-year restoration and reconfiguration project, the Cluny Museum will regain its place among Europe’s premier museums of medieval art and among Paris’s major museums. Already, the project is bearing fruit in the form of two concurrent exhibitions that explore some of the mysteries of medieval art and culture: Magical Unicorns (until Feb. 25, 2019) and Birth of Gothic Sculpture (until Jan. 21, 2019).

These exhibitions, along with a room presenting ivory, gold and enamel masterpieces from the permanent collection, display objects of beauty, intricacy and historical significance. Though their significance may initially be lost on the uninformed visitor, the visitor is quickly drawn in these exhibitions by the objects themselves and with the aid of explanatory panels are written in English as well as in French.

Magical Unicorns

While Birth of Gothic Sculpture is a scholarly exhibit, Magical Uniforms is easily accessible to the entire family. Who isn’t fascinated by the unicorn?—Not of the pink, star-eyed, Walmart kind but of the mysterious, fantastic, legendary kind that flourished in art and in emblems at the end of the Middle Ages.

The Cluny Museum’s most famous inhabitants are a lady and a unicorn, so it’s only natural that the first portion of the museum to be opened to the public during the restoration project is their habitat of six tapestries collectively known as the Lady and the Unicorn (La Dame à la licorne).

“Magical Unicorns,” the title of the little exhibition that precedes the six tapestries, may be redundant given the mysterious nature of this creature with the long spiraling horn. The unicorn has throughout history given rise to myths and fantasies, the exhibition presents various ways in which artists have represented this legendary creature in illuminated manuscripts, engraved works, sculptures and tapestries.

In some it is a magical animal whose horn could detect poisons and purify liquids. In others it symbolizes chastity and innocence. Several illuminated manuscripts evoke the traditional belief that unicorns could only be approached by virgin maidens. Yet other works represent the unicorn as powerful, aggressive or even malevolent. At the time, people were convinced of the creature’s existence; there were tales of travelers who claimed to have glimpsed the unicorn in the Orient. Unicorn fever spread throughout France in the late Middle Ages. Towns and powerful lords placed the unicorn within their emblems and coats of arms as a sign of their own magnificence. The Catholic Church took a liking to its symbol of purity and, when tamed by a young girl, of chastity, allowing the unicorn to appear in images with the Virgin Mary.

The holy of holies at the Cluny Museum, though, is the series of six tapestries known as The Lady and the Unicorn. The tapestries were woven around 1500, during the transitional period between the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. There’s also a lion in each of the six, but the fabled unicorn is clearly the prosperous lady’s more intimate companion as she enjoys the five senses before setting aside her jewelry by her “own free will” (seul désir).

The Lady and the Unicorn had been all but forgotten when the six tapestries were rediscovered, in excellent condition, in the Château de Boussac in Creuse (central France) in 1841. The work’s beautiful feminine figures, the mystery surrounding its creation and the persistent presence of vegetation and familiar, wild or fantastical animals all captured the imagination. The myth of the existence of the unicorn had by then been debunked, but after 1882, when the Cluny Museum acquired the tapestries, the unicorn again became a source of inspiration.

In addition to presenting other examples of unicorns through the Middle Ages and into the Renaissance, the exhibition shows how 19th- and 20th-century artists were inspired by these tapestries. A 5-minute video about the history of unicorns is shown alternatively in English and French.

The Birth of Gothic Sculpture, 1135-1150: Saint Denis, Paris, Chartres

Europe has a number of first-rate museums devoted to medieval art, but the Cluny Museum holds a special place regarding works from 1000 to 1500 since the architects and artists of the territory of what is France today were on the forefront of developments during the Romanesque (about 1000 to 1150) and Gothic (about 1150 to 1500) periods of art and architecture.

Those round numbers are naturally illusory since there was actually no direct passing of the artful baton in 1150 from the subsequently-named Romanesque to Gothic, just as there was no midnight hand-off from Gothic to Renaissance in France at the turn of the 16th century. Each of those three broad cultural eras—Romanesque, Gothic, Renaissance—produced its own strains, evolutions and geographical adaptations.

In this exhibition, which runs until Jan. 7, 2019, the Cluny Museum takes a close look at the transition between the Romanesque and Gothic sculpture as seen through the interplay of three centers of creation between 1135 and 1150: Paris, Saint Denis, eight miles to the north, and Chartres, 60 miles to the southwest.

Enriched by the scientific contributions of the extensive restoration works conducted over recent years, starting with the western façade of Saint-Denis, the exhibition sheds new light on the earliest days of Gothic art and the explosion of its intricate carving.

No longer truly Romanesque, without yet being fully Gothic, the style that developed in Île-de-France (the Paris region and royal domain) and beyond between 1135 and 1150 has been puzzled together here as curators seek to present the wind of change and to follow the tracks of the notebooks of designs that circulated between construction sites.

Although Romanesque art continued to dominate in this period throughout most of Europe, in Île-de-France its supremacy was threatened during the 1140s. The construction sites of churches in Saint Denis, Paris and Chartres formed the cradle of a growing art that combined innovations as technical as they were stylistic and iconographic. Through emulation between builders, sculptors and sponsors, the first expression of Gothic sculpture was born and developed in the wake of a changing architectural style.

(The term Gothic itself wasn’t born until the 16th century as way for Italian architects to claim the superiority of their Renaissance creations over what they saw as barbarian, Goth-like works so at home in France. During much of their initial development, the arts and architecture of that era would mostly likely have be considered as simply French, since much—though certainly not all—of that development occurred within 100 miles of Paris, in every direction.)

Although we owe the invention of portals with column statues to sculptors working on the abbey church of Saint Denis, it was at Chartres cathedral that this model truly flourished, before adopting its most enduring expression, again at Saint-Denis, in the Valois portal. In the rivalry between these seats of power, the formation and propagation of new aesthetics played out in a complex intertwining of borrowings and departures. This new art found its origins in a quest for expressiveness which was achieved by the assertion of a style inspired by classical antiquity and marked by the art of the Meuse Valley around 1150. Bodies were given movement and came to life. They seemed to move.

The clear relationship between the engraved columns of the façade at Saint-Denis and a book known as “The Great Bible,” perhaps commissioned from Chartrian illuminators by Abbot Suger of Saint Denis, points in the direction of long-lost notebooks of designs. By bringing together sculptures, illuminations and stained glass panels, the exhibition shows their common sources of inspiration. More than just a simple juxtaposition of various repertoires, visitors will witness the birth of a hybrid art.

This is a scholarly exhibition that rewards an eye for detail. Adequate explanatory texts in English guide the visitor throughout, and audio- and visio-guides are available to further information.

The 130 works of art in the exhibition—column capitals, column statuary, etc.—come from reference collections of the Cluny Museum and the Louvre as well as various cathedrals, among them column statues from the Royal Portal of Chartres Cathedral. Several pieces are also on loan from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and The Walters Art Museum in Baltimore.

Cluny Museum of the Middle Ages
28 rue du Sommerard, 5th arr., Paris.
Open daily except Tuesday 9AM-5:45PM. Closed Jan. 1, May 1, Dec. 25.
Metro Cluny-La-Sorbonne or Saint-Michel or Odéon.
Entrance: €9, includes entrance to the exhibitions.
The museum’s main portion, the late-medieval mansion of the Abbots of Cluny, is closed for renovation until late 2020. During that time, various exhibitions will be held in the frigidarium or cold pool, a remnant of the ancient Roman bath complex that stood on this site, while the Lady and the Unicorn and a selection of treasures from the permanent collection will also remain on display. Entrance outside of exhibition periods is 5€.

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On May 13, during an auction conducted at the official pawn shop of the City of Paris, you can purchase some of the removed locks. Owning a kitsch bunch of rejected love locks may not be as significant as having a piece of the Berlin Wall but memorable in its own way.

Symbols of love, romance, I-was-here, and if-you’re-going-to-do-it-then-so-am-I, the locks soon lost their 2010 charm as it became clear that they were a form of graffiti whose collective weight was a safety hazard for the railings and the bridges on which they were hooked. They grew like cancer, hundreds of thousands of them, according to the city’s estimate, until 2014 when it became necessary to remove them.

Removal began in the fall of that year from the Pont des Arts, the bridge between the Louvre and the Institut de France, which was lock-free a year later as plexiglas panels on which locks couldn’t be attached replaced the old barrier fencing. Attention then turned to the bridge behind Notre Dame, the Pont de l’Archevêché, which is recently lock-free. The locks on the railing around the ledges by the statue of Henri IV on Pont Neuf are slated next for removal.

The auction will take place at 3:15PM on May 13 at the Crédit Municipal de Paris, a financial institution in the Marais that primarily serves as the city’s official pawn shop. The Municipal Credit, is auctioning 165 lots of love-lock memorabilia. Most are in the form of hanging bunches of 2-28 connected locks estimated to go for 150-200€, along the 13 bridge panels estimated at 5000-8000€ and one longer panel estimated at 8000-10000€.

The public is invited to view the lots of love locks (cadenas d’amour) at the Municipal Credit office from May 10 to 13. The catalogue can be seen here.

Louis XVI ordered the creation of a pawn shop in the capital in December 1777, at a time when usury interest rates were about 120% per year, as a way of establishing healthier lending practices. The Mont-de-Piété, as it was then called, opened two months later. It is still located at the same address, 55 rue des Francs-Bourgeois in the 4th arrondissement.

Profits from the sale of the locks will go to three charities in Paris that focus on aid for migrants and refugees:

• Solipam, which stands for Solidarité Paris Maman, a network that coordinates the actions of medical and social professionals for the care of pregnant migrants and refugees in situations of great poverty until up to the third month after their child’s birth.
• Emmaüs Solidarité, a secular association that manages two centers where migrants benefit from lodging, daily meals, information about their rights, integrated healthcare, classes for children, and sporting and cultural opportunities for adults.
• Armée de Salut, the Salvation Army, an association that fights against all forms of exclusion and for integration into society, including the welcoming of migrants and refugee.

Post-note: The auction ended up raising 250,000 euros, with lots going for much higher than the estimates noted above. This was, after all, a charity auction.

Feeling nostalgic for love locks? See this France Revisited song video of 2012.

© 2017, Gary Lee Kraut

The post Paris Love Locks Sold for Charity appeared first on France Revisited - Life in Paris, Travel in France.

Since March 1, 2016 fares have been set and additional baggage fees no longer apply. The legal maximum price for taxi service is set as follows:

Between Charles de Gaulle and right bank Paris: 50 €
Between Charles de Gaulle and left bank Paris: 55 €
Between Orly and right bank Paris: 35 €
Between Orly and left bank Paris: 30 €

The right bank is more or less north of the looping river in Paris and concerns arrondissements 1, 2, 3, 4, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 16, 17, 18, 19 and 20.

The left bank is south more or less of the river and concerns arrondissements 5, 6, 7, 13, 14 and 15.

Charles de Gaulle is northeast of the city. Orly is south of the city.

There is also a set fee for reservations that may be added to the fares noted above or to metered fares for other taxi destinations, no matter what distance is covered.

Immediate reservation: 4€
Advance reservation: 7 €

Those additional fees do not apply for hailed taxis.

In the past there drivers have been allowed to add fees for baggage and pets, but those fees no longer exist. A supplement may, however, legally be added for a fifth passenger, even if that fifth passenger is a child.

Tipping of 5-10% is entirely optional. Reservation fees may in themselves may be considered a form of service charge.

If, when taking the taxi from the airport to the hotel, you find the requested fare questionable, remove your bags from the taxi and inquire inside the hotel before making payment.

Note: While it is legal for pre-reserved car services to await clients in the terminal, a licensed taxi may not solicit clients inside a terminal. Beware of anyone who comes up to you offering car service.

The post Taxi Fares Between Paris and Charles de Gaulle or Orly Airports appeared first on France Revisited - Life in Paris, Travel in France.

For the second year in a row France has therefore seen more Jews immigrating to Israel than any other country. France has the largest Jewish population in Western Europe, with estimates ranging from 500-550,000. The Jewish Agency says that in the past decade more than 30,000 French Jews have immigrated to Israel, with more than half being under 35 years old. The Jewish Agency does not provide figures on the number of Jews who return to their country of birth or the reasons for their immigration. Immigration to Israel is known as Aliyah in Hebrew.

Despite its significance, the official figure is nearly half of the 15,000 departures that the Jewish Agency predicted for 2015 following the terrorist attacks of January 7-9, 2015. In those attacks radical Islamists targeting journalists at the Charlie Hebdo newspaper offices, Jews at the Hyper Casher kosher grocery and law enforcement agents on the street were responsible for killing 17 people.

Interestingly, surveys by the New York-based Anti-Defamation League have found that anti-Semitic attitudes in France decreased between autumn 2014 and spring 2015 for the overall population, perhaps because the January attacks brought wide public awareness to violence against Jews. The surveys also showed that while anti-Semitic sentiment among Muslims throughout Europe is much higher than among the general population, French Muslims have a slightly lower “index score” with respect to anti-Semitism than Muslims in the five other European countries where the issue was examined: Belgium, Germany, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom. For the ADL’s Executive Summary of those surveys see here.

Jewish emigration from France—for religious reasons, out of fear and/or for economic reasons—is among the topics covered in an interview by France Revisited’s editor Gary Lee Kraut with Tom Cohen, rabbi of Paris’s bilingual (French-English) synagogue Kahilat Gesher, that appears in the January 2016 issue of British monthly newspaper The Connexion.

The post 7,900 French Jews Reportedly Immigrated to Israel in 2015 appeared first on France Revisited - Life in Paris, Travel in France.

Even before you travel you can benefit from some GLK Travel Therapy to get you over the humps of planning your travels in France.

When you’re suffering from a case of Paris-envy, Francophilia, Normandy-mania other regional-minded afflictions, a session or two of GLK Travel Therapy by phone will help lay the groundwork for a worry-free trip. GLK Travel Therapy is also the perfect tailor-made travel gift for your traveling loved-ones.

How do you know if you need GLK Travel Therapy?

Some of the symptoms to watch for:
– You’re restless.
– Your minds wanders frequently to thoughts of Paris and elsewhere in France.
– You’ve been spending hours searching for travel ideas about France rather than doing something useful such as improving your French vocabulary.
– You believe that you have to visit Paris exactly the same way that a friend of yours from work did years ago even though you have nothing in common.
– You dream of food (cuisine, you’d call it)
– You imagine yourself surrounded by great monuments, wandering through unknown neighborhoods, pressing your nose against pastry-shop windows.
– You imagine setting down not to food but to cuisine.
– You see yourself as “belonging” in the heart of café culture.
– You’d rather plan a rendez-vous than any ordinary get-together.
– You panic at having choose between Normandy, the Loire Valley, Provence, the Riviera and all those other places you’ve read about on France Revisited.
– You speak of burgundy as though it were more than just a color.
– You say “baguette,” “boutique,” “macaron” and “champagne” as though no English words for them exist.
– You frequently long to be wished “bon voyage” and to wish others “bon appétit.”

If you or loved one has two or more of these symptoms then you/he/she may have a case of case of Paris-envy, Francophilia, Normandy-mania other regional-minded afflictions that could benefit from GLK Travel Therapy.

The best self-help a traveler can get

A session or two of travel therapy with moi, Gary, Paris’s premier travel therapist (and the editor of your trusty and uncommon web magazine France Revisited).

Your therapy session(s) will take place by phone when I call you from Paris (or wherever I may be) whenever you feel a bout of Paris-envy or Francophilia coming on. That typically occurs in the weeks or months before you travel abroad but could be a matter of days.

As a professional, I’ll help you turn the dreams of your visit to Paris and/or your travels in France into an exciting and delicious reality by providing the advice and the self-help tips that will enable you to:
– plan your itinerary,
– choose the lodging and the restaurants that are right for you,
– understand the logistics of your upcoming trip, and
– make the most of your vacation time.

I’ll further provide you with personalized tour ideas, child-friendly travel advice and other discreet remedies not found on WebMD.

A 50-minute phone session

As a France specialists, I recommend starting your travel therapy before entering the hellish spiral of spending countless hours searching online for tours, hotels, restaurants and itineraries and before letting your friend who once spent three days in Paris five years ago tell you exactly how you should live your dream of travel abroad.

Treat yourself (or your friends or loved ones) to a 50-minute session of travel therapy with Gary for only 65 euros.

If you or they have got a severe case of Paris-envy, Francophilia or multi-region-fantasies, consider purchasing two sessions for 120 euros.

And for that special someone on your holiday list, humor their Paris fantasies by offering them one of the unique and personalized tours listed here.

Get informed and you’ll suffer no longer from indecision

So don’t just sit back and suffer (or let your loved ones suffer) from Francophilia or Paris-envy or Normandy-mania and other regional-minded afflictions. Get on track to the trip that’s right you with a session or more of GLK Travel Therapy with me by phone, or in person. Yes, you or they can have travel therapy in Paris over café or wine.

Write to me personally at gary [at] francerevisited.com to arrange a session of travel therapy or to purchase a travel therapy gift certificate for your friends who may be suffering from Paris-envy.

Be kind to yourself, get travel therapy with a professional Paris-based travel specialist.

Gary

Gary Lee Kraut
Editor, journalist, travel therapist
gary [at] francerevisited.com

The post Professional Travel Therapy for You, Your Friends and Your Loved Ones appeared first on France Revisited - Life in Paris, Travel in France.

For 30 minutes Schlossberg, his co-host Christine Tibbetts and Kraut discussed American war memories in France.

They spoke the Invasion of Normandy and questions about to the best way to visit the Normandy war sights. How long should a traveler devote to visiting the Landing Zone? Can travelers do it on their own or is it preferable to have a guide? How and why to travel as a family.

You can listen to the show in podcast here. (A technical glitch caused the guest to disappear for a few seconds at the start of the phone interview, but the conversation was soon underway.)

Dan Schlossberg,  who lives in New Jersey, is a multiple award-winning journalist (broadcast and paper) especially known for his work in travel and baseball.

Chistine Tibbetts,  who lives in Georgia, has been reporting far and wide for over 40 years.

Travel Itch is an internet radio program that can be heard live on Thursdays from 8 to 8:30pm East Coast Time.

The post D-Day and American War Memories in France: A Travel Conversation appeared first on France Revisited - Life in Paris, Travel in France.

Presented in partnership with the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz and featuring Herbie Hancock as Goodwill Ambassador, International Jazz Day encourages and highlights the power of jazz as a force for freedom and creativity, promoting intercultural dialogue through respect and understanding, uniting people from around the globe.

The 2015 International Jazz Day celebration will kick off in Paris on April 30 with a daylong series of jazz education programs, performances and community outreach. An evening All-Star Global Concert at UNESCO Headquarters in the 7th arrondissement will feature performances by Dee Dee Bridgewater, A Bu (China), Igor Butman (Russia), Herbie Hancock, Al Jarreau, Ibrahim Maalouf (Lebanon), Hugh Masekela (South Africa), Marcus Miller, Guillaume Perret (France), Dianne Reeves, Claudio Roditi (Brazil), Wayne Shorter, Dhafer Youssef (Tunisia) and many other internationally acclaimed artists. John Beasley will serve as the evening’s Musical Director. Further details about the concert can be found here.

The concert from Paris will be streamed live worldwide via the UNESCO, U.S. Department of State and Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz websites. Daytime events in Paris will include master classes, roundtable discussions, improvisational workshops and education programs led by world-renowned jazz musicians, educators and diplomats. In addition to the All-Star Concert, multiple evening concerts and performances will take place across the city of Paris.

Given its legendary place in jazz history, Paris is an ideal choice to serve as the International Jazz Day Global Host City. The city’s major figures in jazz include guitarist Django Reinhardt, vocalists Edith Piaf and Josephine Baker, violinists Jean-Luc Ponty and Stéphane Grappelli, and many more. Today, Paris continues to play an important role in the ongoing development of jazz as a musical art form at jazz clubs such as Au Duc des Lombards, Le Baiser Salé, Caveau des Oubliettes, Caveau de la Huchette, Sunset/Sunrise, Le Café Universel, New Morning, Jazz Club Etoile, Caveau des Légendes, Le Petit Journal Montparnasse and many other venues.

“Jazz means dialogue, reaching out to others, bringing everyone on board,” said UNESCO Director-General Bokova. “It means respecting the human rights and dignity of every woman and man, no matter their background. It means understanding others, letting them speak, listening in the spirit of respect. All this is why we join together to celebrate jazz—this music of freedom is a force for peace, and its messages have never been more vital than they are today, in times of turbulence, in the year when we celebrate the 70 anniversary of UNESCO.”

Ambassador Hancock said, “Every single country on all seven continents will shine the spotlight on jazz for 24 hours straight, sharing the beauty, passion, and ethics of the music. Educators, visual artists, writers, philosophers, intellectuals, dancers, musicians of all ages and skill levels, photographers, filmmakers, videographers, bloggers and jazz enthusiasts will participate in Jazz Day by openly exchanging ideas through performances, education programs, and other creative endeavors.”

The Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz is once again working with UNESCO and its field offices, national commissions, networks, Associated Schools, universities and institutes, public radio and public television stations and NGOs to ensure their involvement and participation in International Jazz Day 2015.

Additionally, in countries throughout the world, libraries, schools, universities, performing arts venues, community centers, artists and arts organizations of all disciplines will be celebrating the day through presentations, concerts, and other jazz-focused programs. As in past years, it is anticipated that programs will be confirmed in all 196 UN and UNESCO member countries.

Ultimately, International Jazz Day seeks to foster intercultural dialogue and raise public awareness about the role of jazz music in promoting the universal values of UNESCO’s mandate. As a language of freedom, jazz promotes social inclusion, enhancing understanding and tolerance, and nurturing creativity.

For more information about International Jazz Day and to register for events on the official website, visit www.jazzday.com.

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