ART ON THE CôTE d’AZUR

by Michael Webb
reprinted from “Appellation”

Artists discovered the Côte d’Azur a century ago and made it famous through their work. Back then, the rich wintered in the grand hotels of Menton and Monte Carlo, Nice and Cannes, but the hill villages and port towns remained inaccessible and impoverished. Signac, Bonnard, and Matisse were among the first to celebrate the magical light, picturesque buildings, and natural beauty of the region, and their presence has been preserved in a score of whitewashed galleries and restored in studios.

A good place to start a tour is Saint-Paul-de-Vence, located eleven miles northeast of Nice on a hilltop that was fortified in the Middle Ages. A pyramid of tiled roofs rises to a bell tower, and a cobbled street lined with craft stores winds up past carved stoned facades. Visitors can walk around the ramparts, gazing out over olive groves, and small municipal vineyards. Vines have been planted here since Roman times and have always enjoyed a high reputation. Local reds include Mourvèdre and fuella (known locally as folle de Nice); Rolle and Voigner are popular white varietals.

La Colombe d’Or-The Golden Dove-(telephone 334-93-32-80-02), once an unpretentious inn where Picasso, Chagall, and Leger exchanged their canvases for bed and board, is now a legendary hotel-restaurant that displays one of the finest art collections in the region. La Colombe d’Or is now luxurious, but perhaps a bit too public a place.

A charming alternative is Le Saint Paul (telephone 334-93-32-65-25); two remodeled sixteenth-century houses that open off the main street and overlook the ramparts. Each of the nineteen tiny guest rooms and snug public spaces is full of character, and the umbrella-shaded terrace feels suspended in midair. Frédéric Buzet, former sous-chef at Le Grand Véfour in Paris, does wonders with local produce, fish, and meat. Ideal accompaniments to his food, especially in summer, are the fresh rosés and white of Var region, which begins just forty miles west.
Before and after lunch, a treasury of art awaits. The Fondation Maeght, on a neighboring hilltop, is a work of art in itself. Belgian dealer Aimé Maeght commissioned these cool brick and concrete pavilions and pine-scented courtyards to house his collection of Braque and Miró, Calder, Giacometti, and other modern masters. Light and fresh air flow through the galleries, and every work seems ideally positioned, indoors and outdoors.

Another perfect match of art and setting is the Chapelle du Rosaire in Vence, a medieval village two-and-one-half miles north of Saint-Paul. Matisse decorated the chapel with windows of geometrically patterned colored glass and bold black sketches on white walls. Shows of work by Matisse, Dubeffet, Dufy, ad Chagall alternate with contemporary work in the seventeenth-century Château de Villenevue-Fondation Emile Huges on the edge of old town Vence. Smaller museums and galleries are scattered throughout the area. The road down the sea from Saint-Paul brings you to Les Collettes, the house where Pierre-Auguste Renior spent his final years.

Crippled by arthritis, he insisted on being carried into the garden, where he would sketch with a pencil or brush strapped to his contorted hand. The studio remains as the artist left it, strewn with paints and unfinished canvases. Farther down the coast, in Antibes, Picasso spent the winter of 1946 painting in the fortified Château Grimaldi. In a furious burst of activity, he created stylized interpretations of gods and animals, celebrating the vitality and pagan traditions of the Mediterranean and the exuberance he felt at the end of the German occupation. Close by, in a former bathhouse, is the Atelier du Safranier, where today local artists come to have their engravings and lithographs printed and sold.

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