Cool, cultural things

A few weeks ago, I finally made it over the Atelier Cézanne, where Elyse has been interning this semester. Cézanne's studio is sort of tucked away in the trees, and for the most part, it is as he left it with all of his original things. It would be such a nice place to work, I think, for Cézanne and Elyse. There are gigantic windows on two walls so that he could paint with natural lighting, and a special to carry his paintings outside to paint en plein air. Elyse gave me a free personal tour, which was awesome. You can't take pictures inside or I would have, but there are photos on the website. The studio is upstairs above the tiny gift shop, seen here through the window. Elyse is playing with Paula, the friendly studio cat named after the painter.
After seeing the studio and the garden area where there's a cabin that has small temporary exhibits, I continued up the hill to the terrain des peintres, where Cézanne used to paint St. Victoire. There are copies of his paintings posted for people to see, and there was a tour group visiting while I was there.
Then, the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, my friend Dani who has been interning with an orchestra here and taking classes at the conservatory had an organ concert in Saint Sauveur, which is just across the street from the theater, but I lamely haven't been inside until now. The picture didn't too out to well, but there is the impressive organ, and Dani is up there somewhere. It was really funny because at first we were all, including Dani, locked out, but we couldn't figure out how to get inside, and we could hear another student practicing. About 20 of us, including professors, students, and French friends, turned out to see her play, and her dad had just arrived for a visit, so she had a gigantic crowd for what turned out to be a very informal event, even though Dani's teacher kept telling her it was a "concert." We all treated it like a concert too, snapping so many photos, and her dad videotaped it. I can totally relate to thinking I'm going to be doing one thing at my internship and getting there only to find out it's something very different.

No picture for this one, but Friday I met Robert in Marseille after he finished teaching classes for the day, and we saw Les caprices de Marianne, a play by Alfred de Musset at the Gyptis Theatre. I read a summary before going because I wanted to catch more than I was able to at the Comédie Francaise--although I understood much more than expected there--and because I knew nothing about this playwright. It was an interesting production. There were hip-hop dancers who changed the scenery and took on a few small roles, and the play which is very reminiscent of Romeo and Juliet was written in the 1830s, I believe, so that was a cool juxtaposition.

I'm sorry Robert didn't get here sooner because he's been really fun to have around. He jokingly asked the other day how many hits he's got in my blog, and I told him he's actually probably got a ton because I kept writing "Robert still isn't here..." for two months.

We've also had a recent addition to the house--Elisa is going to take the place of one of the French roommates in another auberge, but she's been sleeping in the third bed in Elyse's and my room a few nights a week since Fanny hasn't moved out yet. She's really nice, and her mom is American, so she speaks English really well. We only found that out last night, when she told us it's been killing her to listen to the three of us speak in English and not be able to respond. (She thought Vanderbilt might not let her live with us if she wasn't une vraie francaise, but she actually is, and Maité doesn't care that she speaks English well too)

Renaud is the same as ever, except maybe a little mopier because we are about to leave. He started getting sad about my going home long before I did.

Saw Kevin today only because there was a fire at his university and classes were canceled. Apparently, he's a writer and has a blog. It's all in French, but I'm linking it for my own benefit later on.