(While Paris promotes low cartoon, the city of Nancy offers high and accessible art to the general public, as noted at the end of this article.)

The exhibition Le Chat Déambule (Le Cat’s Walk) wouldn’t be so distasteful if there were a hundred other events going on at the same time, as there usually are in Paris. In less restricted times, seeing the sculpture of a dog peeing through a hoop being held by an enormous, rotund cat or Le Chat dressed as a ballerina might be a cute diversion while taking a stroll with a six-year-old. But right now this cat is the only game in town. So its orchestration along the why-does-anyone-still-call-this “the most beautiful avenue in the world,” even though originally planned before the pandemic hit, is like ordering restaurants and food shops to close then handing out dollops of Nutella to celebrate Gastronomy Day. Some will certainly say it made their day.

A collection of 10-foot-high Bugs Bunny sculptures would be more interesting. Bugs does irony and sarcasm far more incisively and expressively than Le Chat. Could be that I’m more attached to Bugs than Le Chat because I didn’t grow up with Geluck merchandizing as the French and Belgians have. Still, I can only imagine the outcry of crass commercialism and cultural imperialism if Bugs were the lead cultural offering of the season.

Belgian cartoonist Philippe Geluck created his rotund cat in 1983 and they’ve both been well known and highly marketable in France for more than three decades. Cute irony, charming incongruity and a bit of megalomania are Le Chat’s brand of humor. Even if the work as a whole—l’oeuvre, as they say in art circles—is trite, it presents the kind of harmless humor that spreads easily and innocuously and makes its creator rich from merchandizing royalties.

It isn’t Le Chat’s quaint humor or childish irony that’s objectionable, and this isn’t a discussion as to what constitutes art. What’s objectionable is the decision of the City of Paris’s to offer a monumental version of a hackneyed newspaper cartoon as the only-see in town during this phase of the Covid restrictions. Given one shot at an outdoor sculptural exhibition, the City of Paris went for this?

While the national government meanders through the minefields of the pandemic, the city government has decided to encourage herd immunity from critical thinking. The bronzes are cute enough in a simple-minded way, call them mildly amusing if you like, but with museums closed, the occasion called out for exhibiting something more thought-provoking or humorous or simply surprising in the public space—something to appeal to our sense of curiosity at a time when cultural gatherings are otherwise forbidden and many of our usual pleasures (not to mention loved ones) are out of reach. Instead, Le Cat has killed the curiosity.

The exhibition is present along the park bordering the Avenue des Champs-Elysées from Place de la Concorde to the Rond-Point from March 26 to June 9.

Sculptural Sedatives

It’s a misnomer to call the current restrictions lockdown. Instead, since November we’ve been locked out from cultural institutions and locked in for the evening. As displeasing as it is to be infantilized by a grab-bag of restrictions and fluctuating curfews decreed by the moderate right national government, the moderate left city government under Mayor Hidalgo clearly views Paris as a playground for uncurious children.

The Geluck exhibition will be gone soon enough but what will remain is the sense that insipid installations, permanent or otherwise, are a hallmark of the current occupants of Hidalgo’s vision of Paris. Two others examples, both installed in 2019, stand near Le Chat: One is Jeff Koons’ bouquet of anal/mushroom tulips in the park on the opposite side of the avenue. Koons’ sculpture was intended as a colorful call to weep for the victims of terrorism but it’s as unthought-provoking as Le Chat in a tutu: take a picture and move on. The other is the group of LED-lit tubular crystal and bronze fountains at the Rond-Point. The good news is that both of those are easily ignored: you’re unlikely to pass by the bouquet without seeking it out and you’re unlikely to notice the high-tech plumbing during the day despite their prominent position.

City Hall has repeatedly reminded doubters that the 3.5+ million euros for the tulips and the 6.3 million for the high-tech plumbing were funded through private donations in collaboration with the Fonds pour Paris – Paris Foundation, as though private funding makes more palatable and less public these mind-numbing installations. (Follow the money in one analysis here.)

All attempts to bring a contemporary touch to the city get criticized, city officials repeatedly proclaim. That is certainly true; Parisians and the Paris-based national press love to debate what’s going on in their backyard. Yet it’s also true that despite the distinct reasons for each these three closely-spaced installations—the grotesque bouquet, the fancy plumbing, the glorified cartoon—they reveal similar attempts to numb the mind of the stroller and the passerby. Each of them is distinctly uninspiring. City Hall would have us believe that any criticism of their public installations is a criticism of progress and of contemporary art or design. But you have only to realize that none of them holds your attention for more than one minute to understand that they are cultural and sculptural sedatives, intended to keep us from thinking anything at all.

Are You in Love?

While Paris promotes low cartoon, Greater Nancy is offering high and accessible art that premiered online on March 25, 2021.

Etes-Vous Amoureux? (Are You in Love?), a project by the Opéra National de Lorraine, may not have the mass appeal of Le Chat but it certainly makes an effort to engage the general public with the arts in an original manner during the pandemic. It premiered online on March 25.

Composed by Paul Brody, who’s American, and developed through NOX, the Opera’s laboratory for lyric creation, the opera is comprised of 12 lyrical short films presenting 12 love stories filmed at 12 locations in the Greater Nancy area. Nancy is a city 190 miles east of Paris. The films have English subtitles.

Watch contemporary opera when there’s so much else to do? I know, I thought the same thing. Then I clicked on the first film and patiently got drawn in. Will you? Have a look and listen here.

© 2021, Gary Lee Kraut

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This morning, March 19, I slept late and so was out around 9:30 to buy my breakfast croissant. Because we are in a period of confinement at home, decreed by the government in an effort to stop the coronavirus epidemic, I had with me a printed certificate attesting to my plan to leave my apartment to buy basic necessities, such as a croissant. The atmosphere in the almost deserted street was ominous, and I wanted to make my purchase and get back home as fast as possible.

Going down the rue du Cherche-Midi, I saw coming toward me a dark-haired woman, middle-aged, plumpish, with glasses, who looked familiar. She must have also recognized me, for she stopped, observing the regulation coronavirus distance of one meter.

Then I recognized her. I used to see her at the bakery where she sold me my croissant each morning. I didn’t know her name, she didn’t know mine, but we knew each other’s identities all the same.

She spoke first. “I haven’t seen you for a while, have you been sick? And where’s your little dog?”

At that moment I was embarrassed. I could not admit to her that after having long been one of her faithful customers, I had deliberately switched bakeries. One day, on the weekly closing day of the bakery that I used to frequent, I had tried the croissants at another bakery located just a block or so farther on. They were even plumper and flakier than the ones I had been buying. So I had made the change.

I could not confess my sin of disloyalty to the woman in front of me. Instead I told her the truth, but a different truth. “I fell and broke a bone at the end of December, and I was in the hospital for a couple of weeks. Even after I got home, it was a while before I could walk without crutches.”

“But what about your dog?” the woman repeated. She looked truly concerned about my little wire-haired dachshund Britanie, whom I had always left attached to a hook just outside the bakery door where I, and the bakery woman, could see her easily from within.

Then I had to tell the rest of the truth, and I felt no more guilt, just pain. “Britanie is dead. She was an old dog, she was 14, and she died of a massive heart attack while she was with her dog sitter in the country. It was just before Christmas, on December 21. I was still in the hospital. I never got to see her again.”

“That’s terrible!” the woman from the bakery exclaimed. She added: “You must get another dog. Your dog was such a wonderful companion for you. It won’t be the same dog, of course, but it will be a presence in your home.”

A presence in my home. That was just the way I had always thought of Britanie. “She certainly was,” I said. I assured her: “I do plan to look for another dog, as soon as this coronavirus emergency is over.”

“I’m so glad to hear that,” said the woman from the bakery. She gave me a big smile.

We went our separate ways, I returning home to face another long day of confinement. I thought about this kindly woman and how sympathetic she had been to me. And I thought about the croissants she sold. They are not that much less good than the ones at the bakery a block away. They are a little less flaky, but not enough to make a big difference. On the other hand, the woman at my old bakery is so kind, nicer than the women at the other bakery, who are polite enough but cool, who never noticed my little dog, or the moment when she was no longer there.

Tomorrow I will return to my old bakery and the kindly woman who warmed my heart in this cold, hard time.

© 2020, Alice Evleth

Alice Evleth is a long-time American expatriate living in the 6th arrondissement of Paris.

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* * *

Chambery swelled with civic pride when the fourth of its four elephants returned last summer. A carnival atmosphere filled the center of this valley city of 58,000 at the base of the Alps. Bands played. Artists created miniature elephants. A tremendous mechanical pachyderm wowed the crowd. A costumed parade marched down rue de Boigne from the Castle of the Dukes of Savoy to the Fountain of Elephants.

There they were, the four of them, their new iron cast dazzling in the light, home at last after an absence of seven months. Affectionately known as les Quatre sans culs, the Assless Four, since only their fore portion is visible, they faced the crowd in each direction. Mayor Michel Dentin, his deputies and several thousand people of all ages gathered around, flush with admiration for the newly restored emblems of the city.

There was a time, however, when the man at the top of the pedestal that soars above the Fountain of the Elephants was the pride of the town rather than the pachyderms: General and Count de Boigne (1751-1830).

De Boigne was a mercenary who had made his fortune and his titles by selling his military and governing skills to various powers of Europe and the Indian sub-continent, especially in the Maratha Empire. He eventually retired from a life of adventure and settled back, via a stint in London, to his hometown of Chambery. Here he donated sizeable funds to charitable organizations, including to build a home for the aged and the indigent, and for projects to embellish the city. A municipal theater was built. So was the arcaded street that bears the philanthropist’s name, the street the elephant parade marched down.

After his death, Chambery would return the favor with a monument honoring his philanthropy and his military glory. De Boigne stands dressed as a general on a pedestal nearly 15 meters high. Yet it’s the cast-iron elephants that have become the symbol of the city worthy of celebration. As a sign of the popular desire to support the elephants, €160,000 of the €1 million restoration project came from donations.

“The elephants may not be the most profound historical element in Chambery, but sometimes an amusing piece of heritage is what one needs to enter further in depth into what makes up this peaceable city,” said Gerard Charpin, communications officer for the Chambéry Tourist Office. “Perhaps Chambery’s greatest symbol of heritage isn’t a monument at all but rather the sign that one might not even notice upon entering the city: Villes et Pays d’Art et d’Histoire” (Cities and Territories of Art and History).

30 Years of Villes et Pays d’Art et d’Histoire (VPAH)

Villes et Pays d’Art et d’Histoire (VPAH), meaning Cities and Territories of Art and History, is a label that’s easy to miss, particularly for foreign visitors unaware of its significance. Yet it brings together the wide variety of points of historical and architectural interest in Chambery, as it does in the 183 other towns, cities and territories (i.e. communes or grouping of communes) throughout France that hold the state-award label. The VPAH label was created under the auspices of the Ministry of Culture in the spring of 1985. That winter Chambery became one of the first towns to receive it. The city formally celebrated the 30th anniversary of its label in January, though with far less fanfare than the festivities that surrounded the return of the elephants.

As a name, Cities and Territories of Art and History is less seductive than a moniker as Les Plus Beaux Villages de France (The Most Beautiful Villages of France), the name of an association of 153 village and the signal that a visitor is entering a village or small town with two listed or classified monuments along with movie-set charms. Nevertheless, VPAH holds out the promise to residents and visitors alike that here one will have the opportunity not only to see but also to understand the history and significance of local heritage and architecture.

The VPAH label represents a joint engagement between the State and the municipality or group of communes to promote an understanding and preservation of local heritage and architecture. The label-holder undertakes to make significant efforts to engage local residents of all ages in local heritage, architecture and urban planning. This is done through guided tours, documentation, exhibitions and colloquia. Visitors can benefit from these as well.

A Vector of Identity

Heritage is given its broadest meaning for the purposes of the VPAH label. It includes natural, industrial and maritime heritage, as well as the memory of residents. Chambery’s Mayor Michel Dantin has called the label “a vector of identity.”

What is Chambery’s identity? It is the culmination of many components, eras and populations that create a city that sees itself a peaceably place in the valley at the base of the Alps.

Geographically, Chambery now appears to be on the edge of the map of France but for centuries it was the center of a duchy that straddled the Alps with Chambery and then Turino (now Italy) as its capital.

Duchy since 1416, Savoy was annexed to France, as was Nice, in 1860. Its firm attachment to France was part of a remodeling of the map of the Alps that soon involved the unification of Italy. Within the castle complex, now the prefecture of Savoy, at the opposite end of rue de Boigne from the elephants, the 15th-century chapel of the dukes of Savoy once housed the cloth purportedly showing a crucified Jesus that has become known as the Shroud of Turin. It remained there from 1502 to 1578 when the dukes moved it to their new capital across the Alps. A copy of the shroud can be seen in the recently restored chapel.

In conversations with elected officials, tourist officials and cultural leaders, it’s evident that they would like Chambery to live up not to its ducal grandeur but to the reputation that the philosopher and novelist Jean-Jacques Rousseau gave it when he called Savoyards “the best and most sociable people I know” and wrote of his stay here from 1736 to 1742: “If there is a little city in the world where one can enjoy the sweetness of life in a pleasant and secure society, it is Chambery.”

Quality Tourism and Programming for Families

To see VPAH as a mere reflection of a classification of historical monuments is to ignore the community-wide dimension and intention of the label. As Mayor Martine Berthet of Albertville, an Alpine town that has held the label since 2003, has said, “The label enables the recognition that Albertville’s historical and heritage-related richness largely goes beyond the context of the medieval city.” The same can be said about Chambery.

Alexandra Turnar, Chambery’s Deputy Mayor for Culture and Housing, the elected official responsible for overseeing Chambery’s proper application of the VPAH label, says that the label and the efforts it implies work on many levels.

“Tourism related to old stones may sound old-fashion,” she says, “but this isn’t simply nostalgia, it’s also turned toward the future… It isn’t just the sights that are important but how we live with this heritage and architecture today and how we will live with it tomorrow… For those visiting from outside of Chambery, it is a sign of a quality tourism, of intellectual tourism, where every age finds its place.”

“Intellectual” tourism certainly doesn’t preclude the pleasure of simply getting lost in the historic alleyways that run through the old town or from using Chambery as a jumping off point for excursions into the Alps for hiking or skiing or further along the valley to splash or bike or hike around Lake Bourget. Instead, it signifies that resources—exhibitions, brochures, guides, oversight, training of guides—are available to educate visitors and residents alike.

While applauding the quality of programming that introduces local school children to the city’s heritage, Turnar, at 34 a young parent herself, seems especially pleased to see “families increasingly involved in visiting and learning about our heritage.”

“Previously, Chambery was very turned toward a tourism of consummation. With respect to families that meant that we wanted activities to keep the children busy. Now there’s more of an effort towards and interest in transmitting our heritage, our knowledge and our memory of Chambery and of Savoy… Families are essential in transmitting heritage.”

Heritage and Architecture Interpretation Center

One of the obligations of the label is the creation and operation of a Heritage and Architecture Interpretation Centre or CIAP, which is partially subsidized by the state. Chambery’s CIAP is housed in the 16th-century Cordon mansion in the city center. The CIAP and its programming serve as one of the primary sites for educating children as well as adults about the city.

“The label recognizes work done of a long period of time as well as ongoing, forward-looking work,” says Sarah Dietz, who oversees the CIAP under the umbrella of Chambery’s Tourist and Congress Office. “Our task is to show how the story of the city is told, through architecture, daily life, history, monuments.”

Chambery’s CIAP, as that in other VPAH towns, is an appropriate starting point for both those seeking an in-depth approach and a light overview of the history of Chambery. Entrance is free. Documentation in Chambery is available in English. Chambery has no regularly schedule guided tours in English, though they are available upon request.

Beyond the Interpretation Centre, the visitor’s curiosity then leads to any number of major points of historical interest in the city: Saint Francis of Sales Cathedral with its surprising décor trompe l’oeil décor, among the largest such surfaces of the 19th century in France; the Beaux-Arts Museum; the Castle of the Dukes of Savoy; Les Charmettes, the house where Rousseau lived with his benefactor and lover Madame de Warens (thereby gaining his view of the sweet life in Chambery), and the Fountain of the Elephants, of course.

“The label isn’t simply a notion of quantity, of how many visits we organize, but also of quality,” says Dietz. “It translates the engagement of the city with respect to its heritage, its architecture, its urban planning and its population. It enables public awareness of urban developments. It is a part of public policy.”

Chambery’s Locomotive Roundhouse

Chambery’s locomotive roundhouse, la rotonde, a rare element of the railway system of yesterday still in use today, is a prime example of the evolving notion of what constitutes heritage. In 2012, just over a century of its being put into service, a portion of the roundhouse was opened as a second Architectural and Heritage Interpretation Centre, allowing for guided tours. With an internal diameter of 108 meters beneath a metal fame, the roundhouse is an impressive early 20th-century construction with 36 tracks that allows for storage of 72 locomotives.

On May 26, 1944, Chambery’s railway installations are hit by American bombers in order to prevent the movement German troops from to/from Italy as the Allies prepared for the Invasion of Normandy. About a third of the town were destroyed, but de Boigne and the elephants survived, furthering their symbolic value in a wounded city.

Despite effective destruction to the railway network the aerial bombing of 1944 also did surprisingly little damage to the roundhouse itself, which was fully restored in 1948. The structure also survived the threat of demolition in the early 1980s when the National Railway Company SNCF planned its demise in view of the cost of renovation. Those plans were thwarted by the efforts of railwaymen and in 1984 the roundhouse was listed on the supplementary inventory of Historical Monuments.

While still in use for maintenance and service by the French National Railway Company SNCF, the portion dedicated as the CIAP allows the general public to be inform and awed by the powerful locomotives. That dedicated as a portion is also used by the Association for the Preservation of Savoyard Railway Equipment (APMFS), which restores and maintains in working order a number of historic locomotives. The SNCF has authorized the association to use them for occasional tourist outings.

Other Heritage Organizations in Chambery

Chambery has a deep tradition of preserving and promoting their heritage sites. The Chambery Tourist Office was created in 1896. Les Amis de Vieux Chambéry (The Friends of Old Chambery), an independent association for the protection, preservation, restoration and acquisition of elements that historic and artistic value in the city and in the department, was created in 1933 and currently has over 600 members. While the association isn’t directly involved with the VPAH label, the label “gives more weight in defending major issues such as the protection or preservation of various buildings or monuments that are the focus of our attention,” says Michèle Chappius, the association’s president.

La Manivelle, meaning The Crank, Chambery’s club for vintage car collectors, has existed since 1972 and now has 120 members. It organize outings and events through the year, including a rally to visit their sister club ASVA Turino in view of Chambery’s historical relationship with the city on the other side of the Alps.

Serge Gross, president since 1998, the owner of an MG TA 1938 and a 1967 Jaguar, among other vintage vehicles, said that “Every amateur collector has a special affection for England.” British cars, he said, account for about 25% of those of the club’s members. The club’s major public event is the organization of Chambery’s Auto Retro fair, which attracts 7000 visitors over the first weekend of December.

The VPAH Network

The VPAH label itself must now be renewed every 10 years. Chambery is due for renewal in 2017, so preparing the renewal application is one of the projects that will be underway this year along with developing new sightseeing circuits and creating new opportunities for families to explore the city’s heritage. “We’re confident to have the label renewed,” says Turnar, “but one can’t miss the boat.”

With 186 labelled towns, cities and territories across France, label-holders have a lot to learn from each other. A national association that combines municipalities with the VPAH label and those with preserved and protected sectors “enables professionals in the heritage sector to exchange practical information and to reflect on various themes,” says Dietz.

In February, network participants from throughout France came to Chambery for a day of study on the theme of heritage sites belonging to companies, such as Chambery’s roundhouse with respect to the National Railway Company SNCF or hydraulic sites belonging to electric company EDF.

“We’re proud of what we have in Chambery,” says Turnar. “We’re proud of our history as Chamberians and as Savoyards. But the VPAH label isn’t just something we have where we can say, ‘There, we have it, now we can focus on something else,’ but rather a constant calling into question of what we are and where we’re going. Yesterday’s tourism is not today’s.”

As to tomorrow, cue the elephants. Following the successful celebration of their return in 2015, a second elephantine celebration took place on the 1st of July 2016. A new annual event seems to have been born in Chambery: The Elephant Festival.

Chambery Tourist Office, 5 bis place du Palais de Justice. Tel. 04 79 33 42 47

City Lodging in Chambery

5* Petit Hôtel Confidetiel, 10 rue de la Trésorerie. Tel. 04 79 26 24 17.
In the old town at the foot of the ducal castle, a stylish contemporary 5-star boutique hotel.

4* Le Cinq, 22 Faubourg Reclus. Tel. 04 79 33 51 18.
A contemporary boutique 4-star hotel between the train station and the elephants. Small indoor pool.

4* Mercure Chambéry Centre, 183 place de la Gare. Tel. 04 79 62 10 11.
A reliable 4-star chain hotel across the street from the train station.

3* Hôtel des Princes, 4 rue de Boigne. Tel. 04 79 33 45 36.
A central and pleasing hotel between the elephants and the ducal castle. Small spa.

Country Lodging near Chambery

4* Chateau de Candie, 533 Rue du Bois de Candie, 73000 Candie Tel. 04 79 96 63 00.
Midway between Chambery and Bourget Lake. Gastronomic restaurant L’Orangerie, noteworthy whether spending the night or not, especially in weather with dinner on the terrace.

4* Domaine des Saints Pères, 1540 Route de Chartreuse, 73000 Montagnole. Tel. 04 79 62 63 93.
Several miles south of Chambery, a lovely manor with a grand view up the valley. Small outdoor pool. Chalet-like restaurant.

Chambery’s Neighbor Aix-les-Bains, a Newcomer to the VPAH Label

Currently, 186 cities, towns and territories across France hold the label Villes et Pays d’Art et d’Histoire. Of Chambery’s relative neighbors, the lakeside towns of Annecy and Aix-les-Bains also hold the label as do, as do Albertville (site of the 1992 winter Olympics) and the rural and mountain territories of Hautes-Vallées de Savoie, Vallée d’Abondance and Voironnais. The complete list of VPAH cities, towns and territories throughout France can be found at www.vpah.culture.fr. (Also see www.an-patrimoine.org for more about how the association of VPAH towns and territories and towns with preserved neighborhoods stick together.)

While Chambery is now an old-hand at carrying the label, Aix-les-Bains, a town of 29,000 alongside Lake Bouget 11 miles north of Chambery, is a newcomer, having received it 2014. “It took four or five years to prepare the application for the label,” says Beatrice Druhen-Charnaux, a guide with the Aix-les-Bains Tourists Office whom Mayor Dominique Dord appointed to develop the application for the label. Durhen-Charnaux says that by enabling programming for both school children and adults VPAH can nearly be considered “a label of social engagement.”

Whether on a daytrip from Chambery or on a longer stay, visitors in Aix-les-Bains architectural evidence of the town’s significance as a 19th-century spa town as well as current sporting activities related to the lake and the mountains. Boats take visitors across the lake to Hautecombe Abbey, a burial place for the House of Savoy since the 12th century. Humbert II of Savoy, the last king of Italy, was buried here in 1983.

© 2016, Gary Lee Kraut

A previous version of this article appeared in the February 2016 issue of The Connexion.

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Yes, pigeons and sparrows aren’t the only birds that enjoy life and food in the City of Lights. Gulls do too. Though not permanent residents, gulls can be seen congregating on Paris holiday between early summer and late winter on their way to/from northern or central Europe on the one hand and the Atlantic or channel coast on the other.

Paris has, as yet, been spared the kind of gull attacks against cats and small dogs that have recently been reported in Nice (from bigger seagulls). Between Paris’s tasty insects, not-too-toxic fish and the delicious trash, who needs a meal of yorkie (one was reportedly lifted from the beach in Nice and devoured at sea)?

In Paris we can take in the sight of these frolicking feathered friends without fear, for now, whether in July, as in this video that I shot in the Marais:

or in December, as in this video that I shot from a bridge over the Canal Saint Martin.

© Gary Lee Kraut

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A mustard-color metal barrier was placed across the main entrance a month or so ago, signaling the start of restoration work on the school’s monumental archway and its adjacent wall.

Today, walking by, I saw that a canvas had been stretched across the length of the barrier. There are images of animals on it—dog, cat, owl, chickens, cow—and to one side of the canvas is an image of a painter before an easel.

I touched the cat on the plastic canvas to see if the images had been made with paint rather than printed on. Paint indeed.

To the far side of the canvas is the artist’s name, Gilles Sacksick, and beyond that, on a separate section of canvas, the title of the work: le Peintre Animal (the Animal Painter).

On my way back from the courts several hours later, a man with a paint brush, vaguely resembling the image of the painter, stood looking at the canvas. Rather, the figure on the canvas, made of broad brushstrokes, vaguely resembled the man.

I asked if he was the artist.

“No,” he said. “I’m a painter today, not an artist.”

I asked him to explain. He said that he was touching up the work that he’d first done in his studio.

He set down his palette to talk with me. For him, he said, his task in decorating the barrier also involved a willingness to talk with interested passersby, i.e. the intended audience of his work.

In my own neighborhood there are walls that individuals and groups get permission from City Hall to paint. Tags grow on other walls nearby and, after a time, on the “official” wall as well. I see it every day and pass by its edge on my way to the bakery.

Once, baguette in hand, I said to a fellow holding a can of spray paint, “Hello. Are you the artist?” “Apparently. Who are you?” he answered. “I’m your audience. What are painting?” “The wall,” he said. “What’s it going to be?” “A painted wall.” “And the image?” He looked at the wall. “Too difficult to explain,” he said. “Go ahead,” I said, “try.” “I have to work, sir. You can come back this evening to see, if all goes well,” he said, giving a shake to his can. He could only see me as an intruder, not a participant in the public space he was re-decorating.

Another time, another wall worker, another stick of bread, multigrain perhaps, I asked “What’s it going to be?” “A painted wall,” she said with a smile. Her retort may have resonated with more significance had she not been painting over someone else’s “It’s already a painted wall,” I remarked. The smile dripped from her face. “Then you’ll just have to wait and see,” she said. In a culture that developed the word repartee there’s a surprising lack of on the streets of the capital.

I like the changing wall before it gets over-tagged. Still, I wonder: Is it just my neighborhood or do Paris’s official artistes du jour have attitude? Or maybe the larger the wall—and this is a building-size wall—the larger the ego? On the smaller “official” wall in the neighborhood I once got a “thanks for noticing.”

Leopards were appearing on that wall. Here in Maisons-Alftort there were more animals. Perhaps, after watching so many charming pet videos online, I’m especially in tune with animal art.

Or perhaps, now that cultural institutions and other private and government enterprises have converted their scaffolding covers to advertisements in the name of budget wisdom, e.g. this shocker at the very heart of Paris on the judicial complex where passersby are now all sentenced to Life:

… it’s simply refreshing to see dogs and cats being touched up on the barrier at a national veterinary school.

We have been told, in France, that street art is a way in which young, upcoming urban artists can express themselves on the wide urban canvas before possibly entering homes, collections, theaters, museums. But the older artist/painter also has his place on the street.

Gilles Sacksick picked up his palette and prepared to climb the ladder.

“What’s wonderful about painting,” he said, “is that there is nothing and then there is something.”

Gilles Sacksick’s artist biography and more of his work (largely without anmials) can be seen at gillessacksick.com.

© 2014, Gary Lee Kraut

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The removal occurred on Dec. 17, leaving the city’s most emblematic monument both dry and naked.

Chambery’s Fountain of Elephants may not embody the pinnacle of local architecture, the General/Count de Boigne, the mercenary-cum-philanthropist to whom it is dedicated, may not represent the summum bonum of virtue, and it isn’t as though the city has no other attractions. Nevertheless, in the absence of photogenic signs of Chambery’s role as the former seat of power of the House of Savoy, beyond its flag, the Fountain of Elephants is as fine a symbol as any of this most pleasant small city of some 60,000 inhabitants.

Furthermore, the fountain’s got a great and evocative nickname: “Les Quatre sans cul,” meaning the assless four. Only the head and forelegs of the four elephants exist. For now though, through the winter of 2014-15 and well into spring, the four will not only be without derriere but absent altogether. Two of them may need to be completely recast.

Here’s a video showing the dismantling of the elephants.

Who was General de Boigne?

Born in Chambery, Benoit Leborgne (1751-1830), later known as Comte and General de Boigne, had a storybook life of a soldier, traveler and hometown benefactor. As a soldier he worked under various states and organizations, alternately Irish, French, Sardinian, Russian and Indian. In 1796 he left India to live in London before returning to Chambery in 1801.

Having gathered a sizeable fortune along the way, particularly while at the service of the Maratha Empire of India, he donated significant funds to charitable organizations and for projects to embellish the city, including for the construction of homes for the aged and indigent, Chambery’s theater and the arcaded street that now bears his name. It was therefore fitting that Chambery would return the favor with a (not-too-expensive) monument to his memory, created by Pierre-Victor Sappey and inaugurated on Dec. 10, 1838.

American planes bombed Chambery on May 26, 1944 in order to prevent Germans troops from going to/from Italy during the final days of the Allied preparations for the Invasion of Normandy. The railway station and about a third of the town were destroyed, but de Boigne and his Assless Four survived, furthering the fountain’s symbolic value in a wounded city.

This is the first major restoration to the fountain since the early 1980s. The anticipated total cost of the operation is 1.2 million euros, with 40% being paid for by the Regional Department for Cultural Affairs (DRAC), 19% by Savoie/Savoy (the department) and the rest by the city and by private donation.

Already in the fall of 2013 the statue of the philanthropic general atop the column that soars over the fountain was removed for a thorough cleaning. The column and pedestal having been solidified in the meantime, the general soon returned with a golden bronze sheen that was then treated to return him to the patina of old age. It’s likely though that few Chamberians missed de Boigne during his absence since it’s the elephants that are the true stars of the monument.

The elephants will begin their trek back to the fountain in May 2015, when they’ll return to their slots surrounded by restored bas reliefs telling about de Boigne’s military exploits and his benevolence toward his hometown. The full project isn’t expected to be completed until June, however. Then the water will again spout from their trunks and the city will once again be whole, if assless.

© 2014, Gary Lee Kraut

Chambery is 2:50 by train from Paris. By car, Chambery is 1 hour from Lyon, 45 minutes from Geneva or Grenoble, 30 minutes from Annecy. For official tourist information see www.chambery-tourisme.com.

Also see this article about Chambery on France Revisited.

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Twenty-thousand years ago Cro-Magnons hunted in the Vézère Valley in what is now Dordogne. They ate reindeer. They encountered bulls, felines, equines, stags, bison, bears. They drew images of these animals, creating the concentration of decorated caves found near the village of Les Eyzies-de-Tayac, and, most famously, at Lascaux. They wore their hides and used bone needles and hide laces to sew on ivory buttons.

Nearby, hidden in the Dordogne hills in the village of Fanlac, a 30-minute drive north of Les Eyzies, a 15-minute drive west of Lascaux, another ancestral type of hide-work is going on. Not as old as the Cro-magnon cave paintings, this craftsmanship draws on an ancient tradition practiced by our fellow Homo sapiens sapiens, in Siberia.

Tucked away among the houses on one of the narrow lanes of Fanlac, just off the village square with its 12th century fortified church, is a workshop designated by the sign announcing “Leather Artisan” and marked with two fish. It’s a dark studio with display cases and long wooden tables, where a man is hard at work making leather goods—bags, belts and cases—that incorporate what look, at first glance, like snake skin.

We enter, intrigued, and were soon transported away from the tourist attraction of the surrounding village and into the story of a largely forgotten native Siberian tribe.

We ask about the snake skin.

“Not at all,” laughs the artisan, Kristof Mascher, holding up what is actually a fish skin. “I use only the skins of sturgeon and salmon that have been farmed for food and then tanned using only vegetable products and dyes. It is a very ecologically-friendly product.”

In south-east Siberia, he explains, an indigenous people called the Nanais developed a specialized tanning technique for fish skin which allowed them to make waterproof clothing.

“My grandfather’s grandfather was a merchant who travelled round the villages collecting examples of native costumes,” Mascher says. “He subsequently donated them to museums in Europe. My uncle, who was researching his life, came across a descendent of this tribe, Anatol Donkan, who is now a renowned artist in the field of native sculpture. Following extensive research and experimentation, Anatol managed to improve on the Nanais’ technique of tanning fish skin, as the original method produced skins that were partly raw and still smelled of fish. In collaboration with a Swiss specialist, Anatol has worked to improve and modernize the ancient method and has succeeded in producing a tear-proof fish skin leather using only plant extracts.”

Today there are 10,000 surviving Nanais, but only the oldest ones still speak their own language. Their culture has mostly been annihilated and forgotten. Donkan, who now lives in Viechtach, Gremany, has worked tirelessly to restore their place in history and to give them back one of the old traditions.

Donkan produces the fish skin leather using his unique technique and Mascher uses them in his exquisite handcrafted creations. Mascher demonstrates the superiority of Donkan’s leather by showing us other skin, this time processed with chemicals in a dangerous procedure that leaves the fish skin flabby and a uniform dull grey.

“I inlay the fish skin leather, using its unique coloring, design and shading to produce different effects,” explains Mascher. “The designs I make on the bags are my little homage to nature: leaves, fish, flowers, or the sun, for example.”

The result is beautiful and unique. See some of Mascher’s creations here. See some of Donkan’s creations here.

Mascher spends some time each year taking parties canoeing down Mongolian rivers. He was born in Sweden but his mother was German, so he mostly sells his work either from his atelier or at annual craft fairs in Germany. He left home as a young man to work his way through France and eventually learned his craft as an apprentice to a Parisian leather craftsman who later moved to the Dordogne. He made his home here and now his eldest son is working with him, learning the business, carrying on the tradition brought from another time, another place.

Find out more about Kristof Mascher’s work here.

Find out more about Anatol Donkan’s work here.

© 2014, Janet Duignan

Janet Duignan is a British writer and journalist living in Dordogne

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By Janet Duignan

I didn’t think I would miss the snow last winter. Usually a sun lover, the mild weather here in the Dordogne was particularly disappointing because I was on the lookout for the return of a very special visitor to our garden from the previous year.

Since arriving in France nine years ago, I have thoroughly enjoyed the variety of species of birds that have visited us. During the unseasonable week of snow the previous February, it was obvious that the wild birds were suffering, especially those that were not adapted to take advantage of the variety of foods we left on the feeders. As the snow melted, a patch of grass appeared in our south-facing garden. And I was astonished to find, when I looked out of my window one cold morning, a large bird with an enormous beak pecking through the thawed but still hard ground for worms. It was a woodcock.

Not only had I never seen one before but the bird itself must have been driven to desperation to come out of the woods that give it its name and forage around in broad daylight as they usually feed in the evenings or at night and are carefully camouflaged to make them very hard to see in leaf matter. I kept quite still in order to spy on this unusual visitor; they have large eyes placed high on the sides of their heads giving them 360° vision. The beak is twice as long as their head, which is why the French name for the bird is bécasse or “big beak.” They are a bit bigger than wood pigeons and sound like a frog when they call, croaking followed by a sneeze.

Unlike some of my French neighbors who like to hunt, I knew that I would rather find out more about this beautiful bird than pick up a gun and shoot it for the pot. I can’t even keep chickens because, just as the Red Queen told Alice when she went through the looking glass, “It isn’t etiquette to cut anyone you’ve been introduced to.” The hunters use dogs specially trained for this type of game, with bells on their collars; they find and point to the birds before flushing them out. The French Woodcock Society (Club National des Bécassiers) specify a bag limit of 3 birds per hunter per day to a total of 50 per year. Its motto is “Hunt as much as possible while killing as few as possible” (Chasser le plus possible en tuant le moins possible).

Woodcocks have been hunted for food for centuries, with recipes appearing in medieval times. Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall of River Cottage fame recreated a Ten Bird Roast for a medieval-themed feast. He starts with turkey and stuffs it with goose, duck, mallard, guinea fowl, chicken, pheasant, partridge, pigeon and, last but not least, woodcock.

Elizabeth Raffald, when writing The Experienced English Housekeeper in 1769, included a recipe for A Yorkshire Goose Pie which also involved a turkey, two ducks and six woodcocks. No bag limit in those days, then.

At least there is no wastage when eating Woodcock as almost every part of the bird can be eaten, except for the gizzard, eyes, beak and feathers. It seems that they empty their bowels before flying, which means the bird can be roasted with the intestines still inside. When removed and added to the cooking juices with a small glass of Armagnac, a dash of lemon juice and seasoning and then flambéed, the resulting sauce was said to be so delicious that, in his Grand Dictionnaire de Cuisine, published posthumously in 1873, Alexandre Dumas Père felt he had to write a warning. He said that, when serving a ragoût of roast woodcock, in a recipe called salmis de becassins des bernardins, it was essential to provide forks to prevent the guests devouring their sauce-covered fingers.

Another delicacy was the head split open in order to eat the brains.

Guy de Maupassant in his 1887 book of short stories Contes de la Bécasse (Woodcock Tales) tells of a dinner party game played with the head of a woodcock pinned to the cork of a good bottle of wine (once drunk). The head is spun around, a bit like Spin the Bottle, until it stops and the woodcock’s bill points to one of the diners, who is announced the winner. The prize is the privilege of eating all of the woodcock heads but at the cost of having to tell a story to the others while they sit by the fire smoking cigars and drinking brandy. The trick, as a good host, was to be careful how many good bottles of wine were served before getting to the game, to ensure the winner’s tongue was loosed enough to make him capable of telling a good story, without being too drunk.

Mordorée is another name for woodcock in French, so perhaps the ideal wine for these occasions would be the Châteauneuf-du-Pape “La Plume du Peintre,” an expensive special reserve with a 16.3% alcohol content from the Domaine de la Mordorée. Wine Advocate (N° 173, Oct. 2007) described it as a limited cuvée which “is meant to age for 40-50 years. From a specific site in one of the appellation’s most hallowed sectors (La Crau), this wine’s level of concentration, richness, extract, and harmony are almost beyond comprehension. With beautifully integrated acidity, tannin, and alcohol, it is a monster wine the likes of which are rarely seen today.”

La Plume du Peintre, the painter’s feather, is in fact the name of the little pin feathers. Only two of these are found on each Woodcock, on the leading edge of each wing. Shaped like the head of a spear, they are so fine that they are used by artists for very delicate work, for example by Renaissance painters to paint angels’ hair and Victorian artists who specialized in miniatures. Perhaps when Claude Monet painted his Partridge and Woodcock in 1872 he used the Plume du Peintre for the fiddly bits.

The impression I am left with, after researching the woodcock through history, literature, cuisine and art, is that I am just looking forward to the next snowy winter and the hope that I might once again see an unexpected visitor rummaging for worms in a small patch of thawed grass.

© 2014, Janet Duignan

Janet Duignan is a British writer and journalist living in Dordogne

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Discovered by three speleologists in 1994, the cave remarkably well preserved cave holds the work of some of mankind’s earliest artists, including some images/decorations dating back an estimated 36,000 years. The newly listed property encompasses the entire cavity as well as the landscape setting and the groundwater basin with its 177-foot natural arch of Pont-d’Arc.

For preservation reasons, few will ever have the privilege of visiting the actual cave. However, a replica, said to be the largest of its kind, will open to the public next year in the vicinity of the original in the Vallon Pont-d’Arc at the entrance to the gorges of the Ardèche River.

The immense Decorated Cave of Pont d’Arc, untouched for tens of millennia, presents three characteristics which are rarely combined: the age of the decorations, the quality of their conservation, and the wealth and abundance of artistic representations. Among the 1,000 drawings are 425 animal figures, with a bestiary of 14 different species, the majority of which are dangerous animals (cave-bears, woolly rhinoceros, mammoths, big cats, etc.), along with representations that are unique in Paleolithic cave art, such as a panther or an owl.

It’s often the herds of animals that get the most attention, but the most evocative and dramatic images are the human hands.

When it opens in the spring of 2015, the facsimile of the underground landscape (ten times the size of the replica of Lascaux, another great example of Paleolithic cave art in France) and the accompanying museum promise to reveal to the public the richness of the artistic achievements of the Aurignacian period.

Hervé Saulignac, the President of the General Council of the Ardèche, the department (sub-region) in which the cave is located, says, “It is a chance that this treasure of intelligence, sensitivity and human presence is in our area. It is our responsibility and our ambition to preserve this masterpiece. Tomorrow, the replica will allow each one of us to discover this jewel of humanity without damaging the original which is in an area protected for science and for our descendants.”

“Our descendants” here presumably refers not only to the Ardechois or to the French but to the future of mankind.

After 20 years of conversation measures and scientific study and with construction of the replica and the adjacent interpretation center well underway, UNESCO recognition validates the site’s universal significance while adding an attractive label for local tourist officials. Simultaneously, the UNESCO label of prestige also leads to great local, regional and national promotional efforts for the site and its surroundings. Some French sites have reported a 30% increase in tourist revenue for the years following listing as a World Heritage Site.

France is a perennial applicant for listing of its cultural heritage sites on the World Heritage List. In fact, applying for UNESCO recognition is something of a national sport in France in which regions compete with each other for national and international attention. Two French projects relative to wine, land and wine culture are to be decided at UNESCO’s June 2015 committee meeting in Berlin: the one concerns the “climats” (a mix of terroir and man-made parcels for cultivating vineyards) of Burgundy, the other concerns the slopes , cellars and producers (aka houses) of Champagne.

Two war-related files are currently being constituted for possible presentation by France within the next few years: to the north and east, recognition for the WWI memorial and funerary sites in France and Belgium due to the fact that for the first time in a major war the dead were honored as individuals; to the west and into the channel, aspects (as yet firmly defined) of the D-Day Landing Zone of Normandy. An application for the Chaîne des Puys, the chain of volcanic cones, domes and maars in the Massif Central, in competition to join the World Heritage class of 2014 as a natural site, failed as yet to receive recognition for not being universal enough (i.e. there are plenty of volcanic cones around the world).

The World Heritage List of cultural properties hit the 1000 mark with the inductees of 2014. The Decorated Cave of Pont-D’Arc is now the oldest property of the lot. France has 39 sites and zones on the list. Images of them can be seen here, an illustrated invitation to travel throughout the country.

More information about the cave can be found on the site of The Vallon-Pont-D’Arc Cave Project, where you can watch this video about the creation of the replica.

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Versailles’s got its royal stables, Chantilly’s got its noble horse museum and Saumur’s got its Cadre Noir, but for me as a horse-lover watching the horsewomen at the Haras National (National Stud Farm) at Le Lion d’Angers is paradise.

During a season which stretches from end of February until late October, this equestrian center located 16 miles northwest of Angers holds competitions for several types of riding (dressage, jumping, 3-day event) for various ages and skill levels from club level to high amateur and professional level, with two international competitions as the cherries on top.

And each year in May side-saddling horsewomen arrive for Europ’Amazones, a strange and colorful weekend of pageantry, sport and beauty. Amazones may make them sound like arch-toting warriors yet they are among the most elegant horsewomen you’ll ever see.

But don’t get a false idea that this is just about looking nice. These riders come here to compete! They show their skills in dressage, jumping and derby (cross country race with obstacles). They also complete for the overall appearance of the rider and her horse. This year the ladies (somehow “women” doesn’t seem elegant enough) competed in two such categories: “historical,” where the outfit is an exact replica, and “fantasy,” where les amazones have more freedom in choosing their costumes.

The history of one-sided saddle riding dates to the Middle Ages, particularly beginning in the 14th century, when it seemed too unladylike (read: non-virginal) for young women to sit astride a horse. Straddling a horse in a long skirt wasn’t ideal in any case, but it was doable. Nevertheless, proper ladies were expected to sit sideways on a wooden construction resembling a chair with their feet on a small footrest—very impractical for controlling the horse and for going faster than pace.

In the 16th century, during the riding days of Catherine de Medici, wife of French King Henri II, one-sided saddles were improved in France in such a way that a woman could sit facing forward and better control her horse—a great leap forward for horse riding in a long skirt. But Catherine’s rival for her husband’s attention, Diane de Poitiers, the greater beauty, stole the show. It’s said that she rode daily and cut a fine figure will doing so—proof that for the finer things in life in France a lover is often more fondly remembered than a wife. Cause for reflection.

Sidesaddle amazone riding continued to be the norm for proper ladies into the early 20th century. Then women’s rights, among other forces, allowed women the freedom to sport split riding skirts and finally breeches while sitting astride their mount.

As a rider who uses both legs and the whole body to communicate with her horse I find riding difficult enough. An amazone can use only one leg and her body in a limited way, but still has to achieve the same results in dressage.

Two thoughts came to mind while watching the long-skirted riders at Europ’Amazones:  “Woah!” and “Why?”

I soon forgot the “why” in favor of the “woah,” for in addition to their obvious skill these women looked astonishing. No stable-boy look here (that would be me most of the time), no modern, hard-to-maintain clean trousers and tops. The horsewomen I watched were extremely elegant and made it all look so effortless.

Hats off to you, ladies! I mean helmets off.

Text and photos © Justyna Gawąd, 2013

Justyna Gawąd is Polish and is married to a Frenchman. They are proud parents of a European child, guardians of one dog and faithful servants of one cat. Three years ago they moved from Warsaw to the Anjou region of France, where Justyna rides often.

Haras Nationaux, National Stud Farms, were created in the 17th-century by Louis XVI’s minister Colbert in order to ensure the remounting of the French army. Eliminated during the Revolution, they were reestablished by Napoleon I in 1806. Twenty-two such equestrian centers spread throughout France are currently operated by the government’s French Horse and Equitation Institute to promote horse breeding and related activites along with the development of equestrian activities. They are, however, being restructured and will soon disappear in their current configuration although the centers themselves will continue to exist in some form.

Guided tours of the Haras National at Lion d’Angers are given mid-April to early September.

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