Heidi Ellison
Paris Update Press Review
Light at the End of the Tunnel?
A compendium of good reads about Paris and France in English. Illuminations The Christmas lights went on as usual on the Champs-Élysées on Sunday, but with fewer shoppers on hand since lockdown will not be eased and most stores won’t … Read More
Sarah Moon: PasséPrésent
Time Past and Time Future
I have to admit that, not knowing much about her and having a vague memory of fuzzy, romanticized fashion photos, I was not expecting much from the exhibition “Sarah Moon: PasséPrésent” at the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de … Read More
Paris Update Press Review
Auctions, Commemorations and Restorations
A compendium of good reads about Paris and France in English. One tattered shoe: only $50,000 A well-worn white slipper with a spool heel was auctioned off in France on Sunday for $50,000. What was the appeal? It belonged to … Read More
Body and Soul: Italian Renaissance Sculpture from Donatello to Michelangelo
Antiquity Reinterpreted
“Body and Soul: Italian Renaissance Sculpture from Donatello to Michelangelo,” another major exhibition at the Louvre (along with “Albrecht Altdorfer: Master of the German Renaissance”), looks at developments in Italian sculpture in the late 15th and early 16th century. The … Read More
Paris Update Press Review
Painters, Philosophers and Heroes
A compendium of good reads about Paris and France in English. French art In Hyperallergic, David Anfam, a curator and art writer, reviews the catalog for the exhibition Cézanne: The Rock and Quarry Paintings (shown at the Princeton University Art Museum … Read More
Voyage sur la Route du Kisokaidō
Floating Along the Kisokaidō Road
Back at the beginning of Japan’s Tokugawa shogunate, its founder, Tokugawa Ieyasu (1543-1616), had five roads built to connect the capital of Edo (now Tokyo) to the rest of the country. A couple of centuries later, two ukiyo-e (“images of … Read More
Chez Michel Restaurant
Lunch on Lockdown Eve
Chez Michel, one of Paris’s beloved bistros, has a new chef/owner, but not to worry, it is just as good, if not better, than it ever was. Longtime owner Thierry Breton has sold the place to his former sous-chef Masahiro … Read More
Paris Update Press Review
Lockdown Relief Needed
A compendium of good reads about Paris and France in English. Save Shakespeare & Co. It’s the first stop in Paris for every new American tourist in Paris and, thanks to its lively program of readings, has become an even … Read More
Matisse: Like a Novel
The Joy of Color by Matisse
Matisse exhibitions don’t happen very often, and when one comes along, it is a major event. The eagerly awaited show at the Centre Pompidou, “Matisse: Like a Novel,” uses Louis Aragon’s Henri Matisse: Roman (1971) as a kind of framework to … Read More
Le Kigawa Restaurant
Classic French Cuisine Direct from Japan
With a 9 pm curfew in place in Paris, lunch is now the new dinner. And Japanese chefs may just be the new French chefs, judging by the lunch I had yesterday at Le Kigawa. Entering this restaurant in the … Read More