Month: June 2015

The amazing MuCem in Marseille


Marseille. France’s second largest city remains an enigma for me. I don’t know it well, I admit. Beyond the fact that it is a bit far, logistically speaking, it is also a lot to take in. Within it’s limits, a métissage or a mixing of all of the Mediterranean cultures can be found. It is quite the macro-microcosm.

All the better then that there is now a museum right on the shores of the sea to celebrate exactly that. Welcome to the MuCem, the Museum of European and Mediterranean Civilisations. Inaugurated in 2013 as the crowning achievement of Marseille having been named the European Capital of Culture for that year, it’s stunning architecture, designed by Rudy Richiotti, was immediately heralded by locals and visitors alike. I was especially taken by the 15,000 square meter lattice work shell of reinforced concrete that wraps around the main exhibition space, called the J4 after the port terminal that had previously occupied this strip of land. While it is imposing, even slightly prison-like from the distance, once inside one feels cradled in a cocoon – even while walking the semi-enclosed pathways between floors and exhibition spaces.

The permanent collection is housed in the Gallery of the Mediterranean on the ground floor. While the museum is purposefully going for an interdisciplinary approach for exploring the historical and cultural cross-fertilisation of this vast region, at times it resembles an untidy cabinet des curiosités. Ancient masterworks are presented next to contemporary art installations and animated films attract the youngest of visitors. The Gallery is quite diverse and it was oddly pleasing to visit a museum where every single step is not over-explained, where you have to become a part of the experience in order to take something out of it.

The same can be said for wandering around the rest of the complex as well. A 115 meter long footbridge (constructed with technology used by Air France) leading from the J4 to the 17th century Fort Saint Jean provides a very literal link between past and present. There one can wander among the lush Garden of Migration with stunning views over Le Vieux Port or take another footbridge to the Panier, the city’s oldest neighborhood.

That open connection between what is “the museum” and what is public space is one of the most attractive aspects of the MuCem for me. And each time that I have gone, I have seen nearly equal numbers of museum-goers and locals in the outdoor areas. While I have thoroughly enjoyed several temporary exhibitions there, what I appreciate most is the environment itself. Gérald Passédat, chef of the local 3-star restaurant Le Petit Nice, is running all of the restaurants from the gastronomique La Table (with menus starting at 49€ at lunch and 69€ at dinner) to the Café where I bought an authentic pan bagnat to munch outside, next to a gentleman who was sun-bathing. It is said that the MuCem was constructed from “stone, water and wind” and these elements, along with a shot of culture backed by the gorgeous light of Marseille, are enchanting – just as they must have been for the first visitors to this ancient city so many centuries ago.

MuCem
7 Promenade Robert Laffont
13002 – Marseille
Tel.: +33 (0)4 84 35 13 13
Open everyday but Tuesday from 11am to 7pm (closing at 6pm in winter)
Friday night late opening at 10pm
Full ticket price: 8€ per person
Family ticket (2 adults and up to five children): 12€
Free on the first Sunday of every month
http://www.mucem.org/en

 

An essential part of this post? Well, I love when worlds overlap. I will leave you with this video of “Au revoir mon amour” by Dominique A. Not only is the song beautiful but the video is in part filmed at the Mucem and features some of the most exceptional aerial choreography that I have ever seen. Enjoy…

…and have a wonderful weekend!

Heat lightning

Le tonnerre – thunder – is rumbling heavily, fast approaching. It is as if someone is rolling around bones above or moving a grand piano from one celestial room to another. It can happen sometimes with the heat in Provence where the pressure will build until loose, messy storms break out. They are predicted for today, have been predicted since morning actually but it was only a little while ago that I picked my head up from an article I am working on to notice that the sky had darkened and the swallows were swooping extra low. So I fed the dogs early and took them out just in case. My espadrilles are broken in to the point of being broken and so I have to pick myself carefully along the rock-strewn path. Sapphire-bodied dragonflies hovered like drones over powderpuff clover, wings beating so fast as to be invisible. I closed my eyes for just a moment to feel the breeze skimming across the beads of perspiration on my forehead but then another boom rang out, closer, and Ben, my sweetest Golden, looked at me with eyes shining in panic so we stepped up the pace home.

Despite the heat, I had stepped back on the yoga mat this morning. Just pointing my red-tipped toes towards it and then placing one foot then the next was like slipping into a pool. It is familiar. Somewhere – I think it is my Sister who has it – there is a beaten up, faded photograph of my Mom giving yoga lessons on the front lawn. Robin, my Sister, is doing a pretty good copy of my Mom’s pose but me, the littlest and probably only five at the time was doing something entirely of my own make. I might have added this into my memory but I seem to recall me giggling at how funny I was being. Today I told myself to go slowly, which felt appropriate as if I was parting the thickness of the air with my arms and legs and breath. For you see, it had been quite a while. And this for an act which does me a world of good, one that I usually say strips me down to the best of myself.

Age is not something that I tend to concern myself with much. But lately, my body has been telling me that maybe, just maybe, I need to be a tiny more specific. I am not the only one. My friend DA has written a really excellent piece for the Huffington Post that circles around and pin-pointing some of the same ideas that have been ringing in my head as evasively as the thunder. To me that is some of what the best of this odd internet world can do – a little lineup of gentle pinpricks of thought or ideas – that can help even the most heat-addled of us play connect the dots. So I stepped back on the mat. 
Despite the house shutters clanking and the olive tree branches swaying like the sea below my window, I think that the storm has passed us by. I have been sitting next to Ben in the shower of the guest room – his fear fort – for the past fifteen minutes but something imperceptible shifted in the air so I got up to see. The sky is a soft orange in the distance – but in the opposite direction now. Maybe the heat lightning is cracking its whip over there, so quick and passing but I wonder if it is waking something up in someone else’s heart as well.

Texture hunt

“It’s not what you look at that matters, it’s what you see.”
– Henry David Thoreau
The light was already slicing hot as I turned towards home this morning after walking the dogs. It popped up surfaces in ways that made everything that I was gazing at look as if it had been written in braille. After closing the shutters tight to keep the prying fingers of the sun out of the rooms that had cooled in the night, I put on my straw hat, grabbed my camera and headed back out to swim in the last of the morning, hunting for the traces trail.
Remi was at the garden, giving a talk sponsored by a community association in this tiny village for those interested in photography. I would have tagged along but for fear of making him feel self-conscious. He had already decided that his main goal would be to help people find a specific photo rather than just blindly grabbing at the whole. I suppose that was in my mind too as I darted between shady spots to look quietly and hopefully, start to see. For when I do, I stop thinking and start feeling without touching…the coarseness of the lime-wash and crumbling stone, the sweet kiss of les petales de roses…In the 95° heat, I could almost hear their crackle and hiss, these things alive to me yet silent. How I am delighted with the treasures found in my texture hunt.

Bon Weekend tout le monde…and a heart-felt welcome to all of you that are new here!

Fruit confits at Lilamand Confiseur – Saint Rémy de Provence

Nostradamus did not only predict the end of the world. No, he also had a pif or a sixth sense for all things delectable and that certainly included using a touch of alchemy to create fruit confit, candied fruit. 
That same technique, one perfected by Olivier de Serres 400 years ago, has been used by five generations of the Lilamand family at their workshops in charming Saint Rémy de Provence since 1866.
It involves simmering a peeled piece of fruit in a bain or bath of sugar syrup repeatedly over a period of three to four weeks until that mixture has replaced the water in the fruit. Then it is left to rest for at least two months to complete the candying process. The result is truly spectacular. Miraculously, with each yielding bite, one tastes only the pure essence of the fruit itself – and this comes from someone who can’t stand sugary sweets!
But fruit confit? Most certainly – especially after it has been taken through the final step of glaçage – a skillful icing that almost makes the fruit look as if it has just been picked. Yes, your fingers will be just ever so slightly sticky afterwards, but it will be worth it. And I especially love that all of the fruit used is local and some – such as the tangy cédrat – are exemplary of the unique offerings in Provence.
These photos were admittedly taken in haste and don’t begin to show the beauty of what Lilamand Confiseur does – think edible jewels. In their elegant boutique, they offer quite a range of products (that also make perfect gifts) from exotic platters costing several hundred Euros (such craftsmanship does not come cheap nor should it), to tasting boxes starting at 15 Euros and a selection of “seconds” that are perfect for baking. In the past few years, the company has also started baking their own calissons (and they are delicious, take that Aix-en-Provence), jams and fruit syrups. 
While there is an excellent on-line boutique, I specifically wanted to mention this company for those of you who will be visiting Provence this summer so that you can go and visit for yourselves. Annabelle welcomed us warmly (yes, she speaks English) and was patient in explaining the process involved, making this exquisite delicacy quite approachable. While I tend to associate Nostradamus with doom and gloom, I certainly am sending a merci back through the centuries for his forecasting the success of fruit confit…quite a discovery.
Confiserie Lilamand
5 avenue Albert Schweitzer
13210 – Saint Rémy de Provence
Tel.: +33 (0)4 90 92 11 08
And for my many antiques loving friends,
13 Rue de la République
84800 – L’Isle sur la Sorgue
Tel. +33 (0)4 90 92 13 45
Both boutiques are closed on Monday.
For more information, click here.
And to visit their online shop, click here.

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