Barbara Pitcher is a talented lady who can switch from fluent English to French to Italian to Spanish in the same sentence. As I discovered not only is Barbara linguistically gifted, she graduated from the University of Toronto in French and Italian language and literature, but she is also a …

You can believe there was a lot of competition and jealousy among artists in Aix. In fact, the poster boy for Aix-en-Provence, Paul Cézanne, was spurned by fellow artist and curator of The Museum of Aix from 1892 to 1925, Henri Pointier. Pointier, who never excelled to the degree that …

The south is a world of light. Luminescent brightness is the first, clearest and most lasting impression it makes when you arrive, and its absence is what hits you when you go back north. For a painter, the challenge is somehow to evoke this world using colours and canvas. It’s …

If you fancy giving your painting skills a boost, I can recommend, from personal experience, the Atelier Ombres et Lumieres in Les Milles. Owner and artist Muriel Moutel will be teaching one-week courses for adults and ados during July. Muriel encourages her classes to start with interesting backgrounds of tissue.

Every June, there’s a must-visit exhibition in Aix from a talented local family – painter Jill Steenhuis, her sculptor husband Sergio Ruffato, plus their son Serge, also a sculptor. Jill paints in an impressionistic style and usually takes her inspiration from Aix, the Sainte-Victoire and the countryside around her lovely …

The delightful little Galerie Maison Dauphine is exhibiting the work of Cécile Colombo from Saturday May 30th – June 20th. You can also meet the artist on Saturday 30th at a special Café Rencontre which runs from 10:00-16:00hrs. Alternatively, catch up with her paintings and ceramics at the forthcoming Salon.

Who is Alfred Lombard? I wondered as I visited the Musée Regards de Provence in Marseille this week. It’s a special experience here in the south of France to discover painters, often local, mainly little-known, who turns out to be quite thrilling. And Alfred Lombard is one such. He had …

There’s a lovely, fresh, Spring-like exhibition of Cécile Colombo’s work in Marseille at the moment. She is a Gemenos-based artist who uses tissue, fabric, bits of text, inks and paint to make colourful collages. It’s at Galerie Charivari, 7 rue Fontange, Marseille 6, near Notre Dame du Mont. Until 15th …

By now you know that some of the Barefoot Blogger’s favorite people in France are artists. Let me tell you about one that I’ve just met — Andy Newman. It’s really an interesting story of how Andy and I got to know each other. Over the internet. You see, Andy …

It was back in August 1961, a long-forgotten incident, and thanks to local historian Alain Paire for sending details of this fascinating story. The thieves climbed the garden walls then up the decorative ironwork of the façade to reach the first floor paintings.