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~ A fairy-tale cottage by the Seine in Normandy

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Tag Archives: Le Havre

Normandy Impressionist Festival 2020

06 Sunday Sep 2020

Posted by chaumierelesiris in Culture, France, Normandy, Things to do

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Art, Impressionism, Impressionist, Le Havre, Monet, museum, Normandy, paintings, Paszko, Pizarro, Pont-Audemer, Renoir, Rouen, Seine

Delayed by the Covid19 crisis, the Normandy Impressionist Festival is now bravely rescheduled to  4 July – 15 November 2020, at museums and sites all over Normandy. We managed to see three of the exhibits. 

First, at Le Havre’s striking dockside modern art museum MuMa, Electric Nights brings together impressionist images of cities lit by artificial lights.

You get a sense of the wonder as artists explored the effect of the new lighting and the scenes it opened up.

Next, to the Beaux-arts museum in Rouen, where part of the collection of coal magnate François Depeaux is being shown together. His paintings formed the foundation of the museum’s collection.

The Seine and its changing light is depicted in many of the images by both the most famous and lesser known impressionist painters.

Quirky paintings we loved: the collector’s young daughters by Georges Picard; and Monet’s turkeys.

Last to Pont-Audemer and a retrospective of contemporary impressionist Malgorzata Paszko at the tiny Alfred Canel museum. The theme of the festival is light and colour, and Paszko’s work celebrates and recontextualises the nocturnal blues and shifting horizons of the earlier impressionists.

The large canvases pop and shimmer and you can lose yourself to them – a rare pleasure, in 2020.

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Night and Day

08 Tuesday Jan 2013

Posted by chaumierelesiris in Food, Normandy

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Armada, Art, home decor, Impressionist Festival, Le Havre, oysters, Rouen, Seine

This year we did it the Norman way. The local oysters came from the supermarket, of all places–but only after a protracted discussion with the fishmonger about just how fresh the oysters were, and how to store them, and what size is best (2 is larger and better than 3). Oyster knives were secured, space was made in the fridge, and the last evening of the year was celebrated with oysters, champagne, foie gras and prune-stuffed pork loin (based on a Jane Websterrecipe).

Normandy Oysters

I’d wanted to do it this way for a long time–you see the oyster boxes piled high at market in December–but didn’t know how or have the confidence to do it alone. We had keen company: she had holidayed in Brittany as a teen, and remembered the men wearing oven gloves as they swore at the boxes of recalcitrant oysters. He claimed to have shucked oysters “once or twice”–know that an Englishman always understates his skill. The oysters were prepared, kept cool over ice and served with lemon, vinaigrette and scallions. Perfect.

New Years Eve Table, Normandy

I went a bit Martha Stewart on the New Years Eve table using bits of ivy, mistletoe and rosemary from the garden. The silvery tablecloth is from Zara Home, and extra sparkle was provided by our guests in the form of a hostess gift (as if the shucking weren’t enough), these gorgeous festive napkin rings from The White Company.

Napkin ring from The White Company

The next morning the Seine at the end of the garden was as perfect as it can be. It had gone all Monet, reflecting the trees and clouds so that even the most unpainterly among us couldn’t miss the mirror effect.

Seine, Normandy

In 2013 two of the major events in Upper Normandy will focus on the Seine. The Impressionist Festival from April to September will put on six exhibitions and many activities on the theme of water in Impressionist paintings. The Rouen Armada in June will host tall ships along the Seine from Le Havre to Rouen. No better way, then, to start the year than on the banks of this great, beautiful river.

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Le Havre in Rain and Sun

07 Monday May 2012

Posted by chaumierelesiris in Culture, Food, France, Normandy, Things to do, Travel

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architecture, Art, Auguste Perret, Easter bells, Eglise Saint-Joseph du Havre, Food, Le Havre, Market, Musée Malraux, Oscar Neimeyer volcano, Renoir, sardines

Le Havre probably isn’t top of your list of things to do in Normandy. It certainly wasn’t top of mine–even though it’s on the Unesco World Heritage list.  For me, Le Havre has always been a ferry port on the way to somewhere nicer, famous for having been bombed to bits by both sides during World War II.

But my ever adventurous husband kept encouraging me to go. He wanted to know where all the boats that pass by the end of our garden were coming from; and he was interested in seeing the largest container port, and second busiest overall port, in France. So we left behind the bucolic blossomy Easter week countryside and drove off in search of urban grit.

Le Havre port

We arrived in a shower of rain, found parking, and ran into the nearest shelter, a large concrete doorway. I stumbled in, looked up, and then had one of those blinking-into-the-gloom moments that you get in the great medieval cathedrals like Notre Dame, Salisbury or Reims. Except here I was in a dramatic modernist space, the Eglise Saint-Joseph du Havre, made entirely from reinforced concrete. Built in the 1950s, the cathedral was designed by Auguste Perret, the architect who led the reconstruction of Le Havre after the war. It’s quite hard to describe the effect of stepping into this cathedral, and pictures don’t do it justice. The concrete is hard and cold and ugly, and yet the overall effect is uplifting and awe-inspiring. If you do one thing in Le Havre, go there.

The rain stopped, the sun came out (every day in Normandy contains about 7 days of weather in other places) and we headed towards the port, stopping along the way at the covered market for sandwiches and where we admired the traditional Easter bells and other chocolate on display.

Easter chocolate, Le Havre

Dotted around the port are some interesting sculptures, and this unusual Oscar Neimeyer designed volcano, which houses a cultural centre.

Oscar Niemeyer Volcano in the rain, Le Havre

Then on to the Musée Malraux, known as MuMa, and its excellent collection of impressionist art in another modernist space that’s more attractive inside than out.

Musee des Beaux-Arts Andre Malraux Le Havre

There are works by Boudin, Monet, Dufy, and many of the impressionists; I particularly liked the several portraits by Renoir, as well as the way the museum windows let the changing Normandy light right inside.

Along the seafront from the museum, boats were being taken out of dry dock by men with a small crane. We walked out along the long pier. Retired couples out for a stroll greeted us warmly, and a class of small student sailboats bobbed about at the end of the pier. Looking back was a rather lovely view of the port, smart new apartments, and the Perret cathedral tower.

Le Havre harbour and Auguste Perret tower

Do look out for the seafront shop, La Belle-Iloise, which has walls and walls of these brightly coloured tins of sardines. What wonderful gifts.

La Belle-Iloise, Le Havre

Le Havre seems to me something like a beautiful easter egg hidden in an old bag, full of delightful surprises that it’s worth taking the time to savour.

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Spring in Upper Normandy

18 Wednesday Apr 2012

Posted by chaumierelesiris in Les Iris, Normandy, Travel

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chaumiere, Easter, Flowers, Le Havre, Normandy, photography, restaurant, Scarecrows, Spring, Travel, Vieux-Port

Normandy is just about my favourite place in the spring. Get there at the right moment, and the countryside is trimmed with white apple blossom, like lace on a Victorian bride. The sky is big and the light changeable and nuanced. No wonder the impressionists discovered light here.

I was lucky enough to spend last week in Upper Normandy. Here are some of my pictures.

Spring in the arboretum, Château d'HarcourtArboretum in bloom, Château d’Harcourt

ImageEvening, Auberge du Vieux Logis, Conteville

ImageSpring garden overlooking the Seine at Les Iris

ImageEaster bells, bunnies, chickens, at the central market in Le Havre

ImageScarecrows, near Harcourt

ImageLe Havre from the pier

ImageSunset, Vieux-Port

ImageSpring flowers and herb garden, Les Iris

ImageVieux-Port and the Seine

ImageYellow field near Sainte-Opportune-la-Mare

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Boudin in Normandy

28 Saturday Jan 2012

Posted by chaumierelesiris in Culture, Normandy, Things to do, Travel

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Art, Boudin, Honfleur, Le Havre, Normandy, Normandy art museums, paintings, Trouville

Do make time for the Musée Eugène Boudin if you find yourself, as we recently did, in Honfleur on a rainy winter’s day. Boudin (1824-1898), a native of Normandy, is known for his paintings of the outdoors, and was a great influence on Monet and the Impressionists.

Boudin Museum ticket, Honfleur

The museum is spacious and the collection not too large; allow one to two hours. The collection includes work by pre-Impressionist and contemporary Norman artists, as well as displays of traditional Norman costumes and artefacts. The heart of the collection is the Boudin paintings.

Woman with a Parasol on the Beach might be my favourite. You see the same lady later in Monet, and in Winslow Homer on the opposite side of the Atlantic. There’s the wonderful contrast between the dark formal dress and the sweep of beach and wind-pushed clouds. Is she talking on her mobile?

Boudin worked a great deal on the Normandy coast, especially at the fashionable resorts of Trouville and Deauville. He painted a number of scenes similar to On the Beach at Trouville between the 1860s and 1890s.

Boudin is extensively collected around the world, and I have created my own Boudin in Normandy collection at the lovely Artfinder.

I’ve written elsewhere about visiting Honfleur and Étretat. Here Boudin paints The Jetty and Lighthouse at Honfleur and The Cliffs at Etretat.

This painting of the Seine near Rouen looks so much like the view of the Seine from the bottom of the garden at Les Iris. I wonder where Boudin painted it.

I love the business of this scene outside the Casino de Trouville. Look at the children, and the dogs, and the tipped-over rush chair at the front.

It seems to me that being a C19 pre-impressionist painter was an excellent gig: you got to hang out in the loveliest places like The Beach at Trouville and Deauville. Check out those bathing machines.

Now here is a view that has changed. Le Havre has been extensively re-built and is on the UNESCO World Heritage List for its post-war architecture. Boats have changed too, although every 5 years or so, an armada of tall ships gathers on the Seine in Normandy. The next gathering is in June 2013.

And here’s a view that hasn’t changed, apart from a few parasols. Life goes on in the same way year after year on the beach: the resort wear, the sailing lessons, the children ducking in and out of the white-capped waves, their screams of delight echoing down the years.

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