On the first floor of the Richelieu Wing of the Louvre in Paris there are several large rooms devoted to sixteenth-century Renaissance tapestries. In 2013, I had the privilege of going through these rooms with Eddy Dijssel (formerly “brueghel” on VirtualTourist), who is a connoisseur not only of paintings but Read More …
When the Pyramid at the Louvre was being built in the 1980s, they also built a large underground exposition space called the Hall Napoléon, which is now used for temporary exhibitions. The exhibition I saw there in May 2013 was called De l’Allemagne (= About Germany), 1800-1939, from Friedrich to Read More …
Charles the 10th reigned as King of France from 1824 to 1830. To celebrate his coronation at the Reims Cathedral, he commissioned the great Italian composer Gioacchino Rossini (1792-1868) to compose an opera for the occasion. What Rossini came up with was a light-hearted, irreverent (but not unfriendly) comic opera Read More …
Why the French King Henri IV felt obliged to marry Marie de’ Medici, of all people, is something I have never quite understood, even though I once had a phase in which I read several books about Henri IV, including Heinrich Mann’s two-volume novel about his life. They had six Read More …