Picasso, Antibes and Cannes

Tuesday, February 27, 2018  

We began our day driving the 15 miles southwest down the Mediterranean coast from Nice to Antibes.  The name Antibes is a corruption of antipodes, opposite, and the old city is opposite the old city of Nice across a stretch of water.  It was a walled Roman city with parapets along the water and a fort above.  We walked the parapets:

Today, of course, there are fantastic boats, both power and sail, in the harbor.  Immediately after the Second World War, Picasso had a studio here, and there is now a museum there concentrating on the works he produced during that time, although there are other works such as this “Head of a Woman” from 1931:

There were no art materials available just after the war, so Picasso made do with paint from a boatyard and concrete panels which he poured and painted.  Here is a 1946 Antibes beach scene called “La Joie de Vivre”:

And here, also in boat paint on concrete from 1946, is “Nu couché au lit blanc” or “Nude Lying on a White Bed”:

Part of learning about the life and times of the painters of South France has been learning about the reputed effects (hallucinogenic) of absinthe.  Absinthe caves were all the rage back in those days, and creativity was supposedly enhanced by the drinking of absinthe.  The reputation got the liqueur banned in multiple places.  It was all hype and exaggeration, but absinthe is now legal again, and we visited what the proprietor claims to be the only authentic absinthe cave which exists.  It’s in Antibes, and the stairs down into the cave have advertisements from the past.  This one uses Van Gogh to promote the evil drink:

Our group gathered in the cave:

A couple of ounces of absinthe are served in a glass.  At the center of the table for four is a special carafe of water with four small spouts and you place your glass under the spout.  There is a special slotted spoon which is put over the glass with a cube of sugar on it, and the water is dripped slowly onto the sugar cube which then dissolves into the absinthe. 

You then drink it.  It’s very much like ouzo—clear to start, and cloudy with the water.  It tastes much like sweet ouzo, with a pronounced anise flavor.  There were no unusual effects.  We then went to lunch at a lovely restaurant where we were served Kir as an aperitif (crème de cassis topped with white wine), and wine flowed with the meal.  After absinthe, kir and free-flowing wine, we took a little time to recover!

We then drove to Cannes, the playground for the rich and famous.  Much smaller than Nice, it is the top tier Riviera town.  This is where the Cannes Film Festival occurs, and the evidence of astonishing wealth is everywhere.  The yachts are bigger, the cars are more expensive, and the stores are amazing.  Here’s the Louis Lempre Theater where the red carpet will be rolled out when the festival is in progress:

In the sidewalk in front of the theater are film luminaries’ handprints.  I’ll show you those of Michel Legrand, the movie music composer who wrote “Windmills of Your Mind” from the original Thomas Crown Affair:

Perhaps the most impressive window shopping is in front of the jewelry stores (Winston, Tiffrany, Van Cleef, etc.):

We didn’t buy.  Tomorrow is a free day and we do plan to do some shopping and relaxing.  More on Thursday when we go to Monaco.