FLASH!!!!!   Paint in Villefranche-sur-Mer (near Nice/Monaco) with us 9 January - 5 February 2013.   We provide all art supplies supplies for the day or week - 200 Euros/day.

ARNOTES:   Running and Jumping

“I feel like how Harika is acting”, a young visitor said. Our pup, Harika, was jumping and running, spinning and turning around to make sure we were on board.   We were headed to the Hertz car rental counter, on our way to the beach.

We’ll be painting in Villefranche-sur-Mer  beginning this week, spending a month under the Mediterranean sun.  If you’d like to join us, let us know.  Painting sessions will run as they do in Paris, and we can help with accommodations.   We’ll be packing extra easels and paints.

I am sorry for the short notice, but sometimes it’s the best way.  For months, we’ve been grueling over where to go, from Corsica to Tangier to Granada, but finally settling on France.   We’ve had a turbulent last couple weeks, leaving our gallery on rue Servandoni.    The shop is for sale, as are the many paintings now stacked in the corridor of our apartment – no reasonable offer (for our paintings) refused.

We’re not so stressed, really.  We’ve had our share of happy distractions, the most recent being our visit to the “Musee des Arts Forains” (the carnival museum)*.  It was open just between the 26 December and the 6 January out at Bercy.   It’s quite a spectacle -- four buildings and an outdoor venue, with a fire in a log and big copper kettles bubbling with onion soup and hot red wine.
There was a bit of a wait before entering the magic kingdom, featuring automated elephants and ladies, jugglers and carnival games 100 years old.   It was overwhelming and bit confusing, bathed in minimal light, like it might have been years before.   In the second building, a bit brighter, were historic carousels, still in operation.  My favorite was comprised of  bicycles, self propelled:  “with 25 strong cyclists”, it claimed, “this machine will reach 70 kilometers an hour.”  I abstained, fearing  45 miles an hour, in a circle, could be downright sickening.   The third building, the Venetian Galeries, showcased an opera of automatons: on balconies above our head,  moving figures, dressed in opera finery, belted out “Pagliacci”.  An official “museum” building housed old carousel horses and wooden tigers, devils and mirrors.

The exhibit remains all year long, available for private visits and parties, a la “midnight in Paris”. It made me want to throw a whopping party – or maybe stage a show for our circus paintings.

But for now, we're off to the south of France.   Let us know when you’ll be flying into Nice or Monaco and we’ll pick you up!

Laurie and Blair Pessemier
Carousel at St. Sulpice  Laurie Fox Pessemier    Acrylic on wood  9 x 14 175.00

Laurie Fox Pessemier and Blair Pessemier live in Paris.
www.paintfox.com   www.parispaintingworkshop.blogspot.com

Artnotes:   Christmas in Paris
Ann lives in a fourth floor walkup, near St.Germain des Pres. Going to her apartment is liking walking up to sunshine and warmth.   The rooms  are chockablock with art and doodads, an accumulation of meaningful objects over a lifetime.   It doesn’t have that sense of heavy English accumulation of dusty extinct birds, but rather a lot of giggles on the beach or in the dark.  It was here we ate ducks and Danish pickle, radishes and potatoes on Christmas eve.

The highlight of the evening was the lighting of the  Danish Christmas tree, with actual candles and sparklers.   Everyone I tell this story squeals about the danger of it, but as the Norsemen present pointed out, “everyone in Denmark does this still, with a very fresh tree and plenty of paying attention”.  As we shut the lights the crowd was hushed and we felt the spirit of Christmas enter the room.

For Christmas the next day at our house, I filled stockings for the attendees:  Blair had the pleasure of going to the Port de Vanves flea market the week earlier to buy decorative spoons, a vial of ”uncut diamonds”, a pair of earrings in a Christmas box, a bone handled jackknife…all little suprises for the stockings.  Because it was brunch, I made eggs with oriental spices over creamed spinach and onions; we ate  smoked salmon, bacon, sweet roasted peppers, roasted fennel, marinated eggplant, green olive tapenade, olives, pistachios, seven cheeses, and poached pears.  Friends brought breads and pannetone, beverages and flowers.  We feasted for two hours before going to the piece de resistance: ice skating at the Grand Palais.

When we went to the market to buy vegetables early Christmas morning, the Egyptian greengrocer talked to Blair about Maryam.  “Maryam is the only important woman in our holy book, and she is the mother of Jesus. We believe in Jesus, too, that he is alive and waiting in heaven for the judgment.  Maryam came to Egypt, you know, after that trouble with Jesus.  We believe she was a very wonderful woman, just like you believe.  Really, we all want the same things,” he went on. “We want to be respected and have respect for others.” He spoke to Blair with his hand on his heart, and it was a very touching,  almost tearful Christmas experience.

I also found a 500 euro note that day, in a very wet spot on the sidewalk near the Luxembourg Gardens.  We were walking Harika, and there it was tweaking its bright blue/purple eye at me.  It was saturated, which gave further credence to its authenticity, which eventually proved to be false.  It made me think I had five hundred extra euros, and I lived my life more generously and with greater freedom than I might have otherwise (I didn’t find out it was fake until Thursday).

We handed out Christmas cookies to all our dog friends in the park – no matter whether it’s Christmas, or rainy or snowy, all dogs need to go out, and we make our faithful rounds with them.

Skating in the Grand Palais, Laurie Fox Pessemier Acrylic on canvas 12 x 12 inches  $175.00