Marion Berger - Get Lost in Paris

29/09/2020

Hello again here! First of all, I’m sorry for having been gone for so long. Since work has been very slow this summer, I’ve spent it visiting my own country for a change. And I’ve decided to share one of my trips with you.

A few weeks ago, I went to Normandy. As you may know, this region is full of history, since this is where most of the fights took place during the liberation of France during the Second World War, in 1944. On June 6th, 1944, known as D-Day, 156 000 American, Canadian and British soldiers landed on the coast of Normandy to start the liberation of German-occupied France. The stretch of the Normandy coastline was divided in 5 different sectors named Utah, Omaha, Gold, Juno and Sword. American troops landed on Utah and Omaha (picture 1) beaches where the casualties were the worst due to their high cliffs, 1000 American soldiers were killed on Omaha beach that day.

Near Omaha beach, it is also possible to visit the Normandy American Cemetery (picture 2), located in Colleville sur Mer. When you step in this cemetery, you are on American soil. It is a place of memory, dedicated to the 9 387 American soldiers buried there. There is also a museum that you can visit, which shows you how this historical day unfolded.

The two last pictures (picture 3 and 4) are maybe the ones that strike me the most. We stopped on Juno and Gold Beach one day, and the sceneries were so breathtaking, the atmosphere so quiet, it was almost impossible to believe that such horrors happened on these very spot. Normandy is such an interesting region, full of beauty and history. If one day we are able to travel again and you get the chance to go to there, please do :)

27/04/2020

Have a glimpse inside the Louvre until we can all go back 😍

21/04/2020

Hey everyone!

Today, I wanted to tell you about one of my favorite work of art of all times: “Self-Portrait” by Vincent Van Gogh. For those of you who know me personally, I’m sure this is not a big surprise. We all have favorite artists, whose work moves us or attracts us more deeply than others, and that’s what his art does for me.

To comprehend this artwork, we have to talk about Vincent Van Gogh’s mental health. As I am sure you all know, Van Gogh was not mentally stable. Even today, experts are still not sure what illness pushed him to cut off his own ear. They came up with several possible diagnoses, among which you can find bipolar disorder, epilepsy, borderline personality disorder or even schizophrenia. But back then, those explanations were not yet available. So struggling financially and mentally, Van Gogh stayed anonymous all his life and committed su***de in 1890.

In this post, I want to focus on the way Van Gogh perceived and try to understand himself through his art. Over the course of his career, he painted more than 30 self-portraits, but I chose this one painted in 1889 since I find it particularly powerful. Painted in the monastery and hospice of Saint-Remy in the south of France, it reflects his particular state of mind at the time.

The first thing one notice in this self-portrait is the background. Also a reminder of the type of art that can be drawn by mentally-ill patients as a therapy technique, those whirlwind create an impression of movement and frenzy. This energy in the background shows a state of constant agitation in Van Gogh’s mind, and experts concluded that he must have painted it in a psychotic state. Once you focus on his face, you also notice that the same whirlwinds, expressing the same rhythm, are used, which could stress out the fact that his feelings are all over and around him, he feels overwhelmed by them. Although this agitation in the painting clearly reflects his troubled mind, his posture seems to be telling us something else. He is sitting straight, his eyes fixed on something; he seems to be in control. But then, you look in his eyes and you see anger, sadness and exhaustion. He is tired of trying to understand himself. Also, this is a self-portrait, so Van Gosh was not posing. This painting carries a sense of false immobility: given the agitation of his mind, he would not be able to sit still and pose for hours. He is too troubled, and paradoxically, too full of life for that. That’s one of the reasons why he used the art of self-portrait, not only as a mean to experience with color patterns, but also to be able to describe himself in the most honest way possible. Finally, let’s all remember that art is subjective. We all have our interpretations. So although it can be argued, when you look closer at his lips, you can see a drop of red, which could be blood. He seems to be biting his lip until it bleeds, adding a new level of uneasiness and suffering to his self-depiction.

Once again, art is subjective but I hope you enjoyed getting a glimpse of Vincent Van Gogh’s complicated mind through his art. And what better way to end this post than using his own words: “I put my heart and soul into my work, and I lost my mind in the process.”

Thanks for reading, and stay positive :)

17/04/2020

This quarantine is a great opportunity for me to keep learning about Paris, so that I have more to share with you all when all this is over. And in my “studies”, I stumbled upon some pictures that I thought were worth sharing.

120 years ago, Paris hosted the Universal Exposition of 1900. It was the biggest universal exposition ever set up in France, and it marked the end of the 19th century. Several monuments were built, some of them still standing today such as the Grand Palais and the Petit Palais.

It was also an opportunity to celebrate progress! A palace dedicated to electricity was set up in the Champs de Mars; a new city emerged right in the center of the old one, made of white palaces where countries from all over the world could compare their productions, from furniture to jewelries; palaces representing several countries in the world were build along the left bank of the Seine river which was called Nations Street and it was also the launch of the first metro line.

All the pictures below give you a glimpse of what Paris looked like during this colossal event. And if you’re curious and want to see more, here’s a link to a film shot by Louis Lumière’s team, which also shows the shameful side of these expositions: France’s colonial past and its exploitation of the colonies. The video is in French but a kind soul translated everything in English in the comments so here you go: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lasm1gGmck4.

Have a good week-end, if those still exist!

15/04/2020

One year ago today, the whole world was watching Notre Dame de Paris burn.

After a whole night of struggle, firemen managed to save the rest of it, but the whole roof and framework were lost. This roof was called "The Forest", since it was all made of wood, 800 years old wood.

The cause of the fire is yet to be determined but good news! After a year of hard and very precise work, the cathedral is now safe from any danger of collapsing. Now we will have to wait 4 years (probably more) before we can enter and admire the wonders of the great cathedral again.

Until next time, beautiful !

14/04/2020

Hello everyone !

Guess who’s back ? As we are all living through a crazy and unique period right now, I thought I would come back here and keep on sharing. And as a matter of fact, this quarantine started right before I was about to fulfill one of my biggest goal as a guide : touring the Catacombs of Paris. So until I can show you those mysteries in real life, let me take you for a little virtual tour down below.

Piles of bones, strange parties or horror films? They are usually what comes to mind when you think of the Catacombs. Though originally, it was a much more practical (and less fun) place. Used as underground quarries back in the Roman Empire all the way through the Middle-Ages, tons of stones were extracted from there to build parts of the city we still live in today, such as Notre-Dame de Paris or the Louvre.

But for hundreds of years, there has been a whole world down there, and today I am going to introduce you to the first Catartist that ever existed. Just before the French Revolution, in the 1780s, King Louis XVI decided to reinforce the Catacombs, and sent a bunch of workers down there. One of them was a fellow named Decure. He first went to prison for a while in Majorca, and then spent three years working on the reinforcements down below. But he dedicated his spare time to an entirely different project : sculpting these two works of arts that you can find on the pictures. Those were the fort and harbor he saw from the window of his prison cell. He died right after in the Catacombs, but forever left his mark as the first artist the underground world has ever known.

I hope you know a little bit more about the Catacombs now and remember to stop by as soon as you can come back to Paris. As for now, stay home & be safe :)

14/04/2020

17/09/2018

With more than a hundred churches in Paris, it’s easy to miss some of them. But next time you’re here, try to go see this one.

This is the Saint-Eustache church, built between the 16th and 17th centuries and located in the very center of Paris. It’s been through a lot of renovations and changes, but here it is, still standing, more breathtaking than ever.

21/08/2018

When you think of a parisian museum, your mind goes directly to the Louvre. But this one, the Orsay, an old train station turned into a museum in the 80’s, is an amazing place to discover here in Paris.
One of my favorite, for sure.

02/08/2018

July 15th - France wins the World Cup and Paris celebrates.