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Modernising Paris
Hubert Robert, 'Demolition of houses on the Notre-Dame Bridge in 1786'. Pulling down buildings was sometimes a public health measure. I’ve been in Paris for over a week. The reason I’m here is a study tour, run by RMIT Melbourne and Open Universities Australia, called 'In the Footsteps of the Impressionists'. Starting on Monday we will spend two weeks studying the art and culture of late nineteenth century Paris. The impressionist painters are so well-regarded now that it is easy to forget that, in their time, they were semi-outcasts, bohemians in revolt against mainstream art. Since the study tour will focus on 1870-1905 I wanted to spend time finding out about the situation before 1870.
Paris had been living through revolutions for a generation. During the 1860s a lot of the old narrow streets were pulled down, not only to make way for the grand avenues that would express the glory of the nation, but also to make it harder for the revolting masses to build barricades. It’s not necessary to go to Versailles to get a sense of the opulence that the few wealthy people enjoyed at that time; it’s on display in a number of museums. Napoleon III’s apartments in the Louvre testify to the fact that the original revolution had not yet achieved its goals
Revolutionary Paris
Ernest Meissonier, 'The Barricade in the rue de la Mortellerie, June 1948', 1850. The risk of getting killed never seemed to stop Parisians pulling up paving stone and barricading the streets. of Liberty, Equality and Fraternity. The women who marched on Versailles in 1789 would probably have been happy to march again eighty years later and to confront the third Emperor.
I've found some old narrow streets and even a few medieval buildings but mainly they are lined with the grand buildings that were build in the seventeenth and nineteenth centuries. But at the time of the Impressionists the wholesale reconstruction was very much in-the-face. The ideals of the original revolution must have still rung clear. Industrialisation was mounting pace. The railways had come to France. Thus they were painting in a world of unprecedented political and social upheaval. It would have been easy to be iconoclastic.
At the first Impressionist exhibition in 1863 critics were aghast and accused them of producing unfinished daubings in place of paintings. These critics had had no practice at looking at painting in the new style and many of them literally couldn’t make out what was in front of them. In the Louvre I saw the work that they were familiar with. Many nineteenth paintings depicted grand historical scenes, classical allegories or solemn portraits. Painting simple, everyday scenes was considered downmarket, even when
Old Paris
The old city consisted of buildings tightly packed around courtyards and narrow streets around medieval masterpieces like Notre Dame. This model is in the Carnavalet Museum. executed in a conventional style.
I also took a trip to Chartres, where I saw a cathedral more famous than Notre Dame, and a large, beautifully preserved medieval market town; this made me wonder how Paris would have been if it had not been so extensively developed in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. There are two pages of photographs below: the first of old Paris and Chartres and the second with some typical Nineteenth century paintings in the Louvre.
Travel Hints
Our wonderful tour leader directed us to a hotel which is excellent if one is looking for above-hostel standard accommodation in the heart of Montmartre. I have a studio room with a well-equipped kitchenette, the pay-off being that I do my own cleaning. It is the Adagio Paris Montmartre aparthotel,
http://www.adagio-city.com/fr/hotel-6792-adagio-paris-montmartre/location.shtml.
For a direct and economical airport pickup you can’t go past the Parishuttle, though friends who arrived late in the evening might not endorse this comment,
http://www.parishuttle.com/.
Museums I’ve visited so are
Musée du Louvre:
http://www.louvre.fr/en Musée Delacroix:
http://www.musee-delacroix.fr/en/ Musée Carnavalet:
http://www.carnavalet.paris.fr/en/homepage How I’ve Been
I’ve not set foot in Europe since 1997 and once
Roman Paris
But Paris is older than that; these Roman baths were built around 215AD and are beside the Boulevard St-Michel in the Latin Quarter. again I find my French hasn’t quite deserted me. One the one hand everything seems new and interesting while on the other it feels terribly familiar. It is the first time I’ve seen Montmartre in the daytime … quite a contrast to my 1960s student memories. The course starts soon and then it will be full steam ahead. I’ve been doing some sketching, the results of which are on show at
https://www.facebook.com/GillianPerrettArtist.
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marcela
non-member comment
How wonderful Gillian! Really enjoyed reading your blog! Absolutely loved it x