Artists in Southern France

Picasso's Cote d'Azur hanging in the recreation room of my house (**).

While attending a physics conference in Paris (July 2002), I was fortunate enough to spend two days in the City of Nice and in the Cote d'Azur area known also as French Riviera. It was a very brief trip in view of enormous cultural resources available in that area. I of course brought my camera with me and took some interesting photos.


Four years later, in 2006, I went to Cote d'Azur again. I went there with my wife and spent four nights there. In February of 2017, I went there again to take more photos.

Many artists spent their times in this area, and there are good reasons. Let us look at some photos from this part of the world.

Chagall's image of the Garden of Eden. God created two women for him. So did He for me even in the Chagall Museum. Click here for my own Garden of Eden.

• Mark Chagall Museum is within a walking distance from the Nice-Ville Station. I went there in 2002 with a film camera, and with a digital camera in 2017. It is a pleasant walk thanks to the orange trees along the street.
  1. When I was there in 2002. I wanted to have a photo of myself at the entrance of the museum. I asked a gentleman from the Netherlands to push the shutter button for me. He was kind enough to tell his wife to stand with me.

  2. This museum has a good collection of Chagall's paintings based on the Bible stories.
     • Abraham ready to sacrifice his son. This photo was taken in 2017. I was there at the same place in 2002.
     • Moses receiving the Ten Commandments from God.
     • Garden of Eden. According to this picture, God created two women, instead of one, for him. It was a pleasant surprise for me because I also think God created two women for me, and I even have a scientific evidence to prove this claim. Click here for my explanation.
     • This work is also about a Bible story, but I am not able to tall which story. This photo was taken in 2002. It was still there in 2017.

  3. While in Nice, Chagall became interested in putting his artworks into ceramics. The museum displays some of his works along this direction.
  4. Click here for more about Chagall and his art works.

• The Matisse Museum a red brick building in an ancient Roman city on the top of the hill.

  Matisse's expression of one woman, and two women,

  1. This painting is prominently displayed in the museum. This seems to be how the woman looks to Henri Matisse.
  2. This is the two-dimensional image of a woman.
  3. He also had a three-dimensional image.
  4. Image of two women to him.

  5. In addition to women, Nice Beach looked beautiful to him. Here is his image of the beach.
  6. With this art work, Matisse was trying to tell us something. I am not able to figure out what he says. Can you?
  7. Click here for some of Mstisse's well-known works stored in this museum. There are many other museums throughout the world holding his paintings.

  8. When I went there in 2002, the museum did not allow me take photos inside the building. In order to overcome this difficulty, I decided to have a photo with an artistic object constructed by God. Here is a photo of myself with a French lady from Strasbourg near Germany. I asked her whether Mount Donan is close to her place. She said "not far." She knew how Victor Hugo was born.

• Since the Matisse Museum is built within an ancient Roman city, there are many Roman art works around the museum building.
  1. Roman arena near the Museum building
  2. Entrance the Arena.
  3. Museum Building seen from the Arena
  4. Nice Astronomical Observatory seen from the Arena.

  5. Roman wall seen from the Museum building
  6. Roman city and street.
  7. Waterways within the city.

• City of Nice. The entire city of a great museum, with many interesting people.

• Picasso Museum. This museum is located in the city of Antibes, about one-hour bus ride from Nice. Here also, I could take photos only outside the building.
  1. with Korean students outside the building overlooking the sea. Because of my national origin, I become very happy whenever I meet Korean students, especially at holy places like the Picasso Museum.
  2. I like Picasso, because he forces me to think. I own many Picasso items including two neckties carrying Picasso's paintings.
  3. Chateau Grimaldi seen from across the Antibes Bay.
  4. Three Australian Ladies admiring the Chateau Grimaldi at the Antibes Bay (2006).
  5. Closer View of the Chateau.

  6. Picasso Tie. In this photo with Anton Zeilinger, I am wearing a Picasso nectie. This photo was taken during the banquet honoring John A. Wheeler (Princeton, March 2002).
  7. In 1980, there was a Picasso exhibition in New York City. I went there and received a basic education on this great artist. in Madrid (Spain), I visited the Picasso Square.
  8. Picasso Sculpture on the Campus of Princeton University. This art piece called the "Head of a Woman" was constructed by a Norwegian artist Carl Nesjar in 1971 under the supervision of Pablo Picasso.
• Click here, if you are not satisfied the collection of Picasso paintings given above.
• You can also go to the Picasso Museum in Paris. You can take photos there.

• Paul Sezanne was born in Aix-en-Provence near Marseille (France), and maintained his house (not necessarily his birth house) there. He painted many pictures there. I was inside the house but not allowed to take photos. This house is within a wooded area, and it is not difficult to see that his paintings were influenced by the natural beauty surrounding the house. Let us see some photos.
  1. This is the entrance to his house.
  2. This roadway leads to the house.
  3. I am sitting at the outside table, which seems similar to (if not the same as) the table Cezanne used to enjoy.
  4. His house is hidden by trees. There are inside the house many painting tools Cezanne used to create his great paintings. I was not allowed to photograph them.
  5. How about his paintings? Not there. However, there are always Cezanne exhibitions going on around the world. I went to one exhibition held at the Musée du Luxembourg in Paris. I went to another Cezanne exhibition at the National Gallery of Art in Washington.
  6. Click here for the Wikipedia list of his paintings.

  7. Aix-en-Provence is a beautiful city. This city should be proud of Paul Cezanne. There is his statue at the city center. Its environment reflects the beauty of his paintings.
  8. Click here for a comprehensive collection of Cezanne's paintings.

• I am standing at the entrance of the Van Gogh House in Arles.
  1. This bed in his bed room is a reproduction. The original bed is lost during World War II.
  2. This is Van Gogh's self portrait.
  3. The city of Arles was constructed by ancient Romans. They still use the stadium originally built by Romans. The outside wall of this stadium looks like this.
  4. Here is the Wikipedia list of Van Gogh's paintings.

• There are many other museums in the city of Nice. In fact, the entire city of Nice is a great museum. One notable place is the Russian Orthodox Church built by the Romanov family. As you know, orthodox churches are art museums filled with paintings and sculptures. This church has a very interesting history.

  Russian Orthodox Church in Nice. Statue of Alexander II and the chapel dedicated to him at the church ground. Why did I want to have a photo with him? Click here for the answer.

  1. Russian rulers were always interested in establishing sea routes. The most effective way was and still is to start from the seaports in Crimea. However, as a result of the Crimean War (1853-56), their sea route through Black Sea was blocked by Ottoman Turkey and European powers.

  2. Russia's Alexander II then had an idea of establishing a Russian community in the Mediterranean city of Nice, using rail routes from Moscow to Berlin, Berlin to Paris, and then to Paris to Nice. He himself took a train ride from St. Petersburg to Nice. He liked the place and encouraged Russians to move to Nice.

  3. His grandson, Nicholas II, built a Russian church were his grandfather stayed while in Nice.
  4. There still is a Russian community in Nice with a big Russian church. You can meet many Russians there, including a Russian Orthodox cathedral.

     In 2003, I met there these cheerful Russian mother and daughter They were very happy to talk with me because I know about their country.

  5. Not many of you know that Alexander II also had an ambition toward the Pacific Ocean.

     In 1867, he sold Alaska to the United States for 7 million US-Dollars. Since Lincoln was assassinated in 1967, most of the negotiation took place during Lincoln's presidency.

     He then turned his attention toward the Pacific Ocean. At that time China's Qing Dynasty was powerless, and Russians easily established their city called Harbin in the territory of China. This place can be reached through the Songhua River from the Russian city of Khavarosk which is connected to Moscow through the Trans-Siberian Railway system.

     Russian routes toward the Pacific Ocean.

     From the time of Catherine the Great to the end of World War I, Turkish troops were engaged in the business of stopping the Russian expansion to the Mediterranean Sea. Later, they participated in the war to block the Soviet ambition toward the Pacific Ocean. This war is known as the Korean War (1950-53). I was there during the war.

     From Harbin, Russians were interested in moving toward two peninsulas, namely the Korean Peninsula, and the Liaodong Peninsula of China. Click here for the map. Russians were quite successful in moving toward Liaodong. Japan was also interested in that part of the world, resulting in the Russo-Japanese War (1904-05).

  6. Russians were and still are interested in the Korean Peninsula. The present form of North Korea's government was installed by Stalin's Soviet Union in 1945. The Korean war (1950-53) was initiated by Stalin's ambition to extend his influence to the Pacific Ocean. To him, the Korean peninsula was the Crimea of the Pacific Ocean. I was there during the the Korean war.

     Recently, Vladimir Putin gave visa-free privileges to all South Koreans who want to visit Russia, so that Russians can go to South Korea freely. Russia still maintains a keen interest in the Pacific Ocean.

  7. As early as 1875, Queen Victoria of England thought she had to block the Russian approach to the Pacific Ocean, resulting in Christianity in Korea. Click here to see how this happened.

     These days, who controls the Pacific Ocean is a big issue, but it is an old issue.

• I seem to enjoy talking about art and history. The reason is very simple. I regard them as parts of physics. How about engineering? With this point in mind, let us go to the Roman aqueduct at Pont du Gard near southern French cities of Avignon and Nimes. The construction of this water bridge was completed during the reign of Augustus. It changed the map of water flow in Southern France.

  

  I heard about this Roman engineering achievement sometime ago, but it was not until February of 2017 to go there and take some photos.

  My expression of the Pont du Garde. Then how to build the bridge between these two great physicists? Click here for a detailed story.

  1. This is a photo of myself with the aqueduct in the background.

  2. I also took this photo of the bridge and the river. This river is called Gard. This is the reason why this engineering work is called Pont du Gard.

  3. This photo shows how the bridge stones were stacked up.

• Artists have their own ways of expressing human bodies. This is one of Picasso's expression of a smiling woman, according to a statue on the campus of Princeton University.
  1. Thus, I should have my own way of expressing this Point. I am a physicist.

  2. I show you frequently the photo of Dirac and Feynman with their lack of communication. I have written many papers on building a communication channel between these God-like physicists. Click here for this gap between Dirac and Feynman.

  3. According to Gell-Mann, the proton at rest is a bound state of three quarks. According to Feynman, fast-moving proton consists of an infinite number of partons. Einstein's Lorentz covariance is supposed to fill this Gell-Mann-Feynman gap. Do you know how this happens? Click here.

  4. Recently, I became more ambitious. I talked about the gap between Bohr and Einstein.

  5. Needless to say, this expression came from my experiences in physics since 1965. In 1965, every physicist was working on S-matrices. So was I, but I was also interested in how to make localization of wave functions consistent with Einstein's Lorentz covariance. In 1965, I produced a result very hostile to the leadership of the American physics community at that time, and I almost got kicked out from the United States. However, the United States has been very nice to me. I am publishing papers based on what I believe in. Click here for a story.

  6. To summarize, it is much easier to build a bridge than creating mountains. This is the way to do physics. Look at the way in which Einstein approached physical problems. Click here. Here, I am not talking about anything special. You already know how to build canals.

• You may also be interested in the following fun files.
  1. Art museums around the world.

  2. The entire city of Paris is a great museum.

  3. So is Florence.

Why is he with Einstein?

• copyright@2017 by Y. S. Kim, unless otherwise specified.
  

• I purchased this framed reprint of Picasso's Cote d'Azur from an art store in New York City for $80 about 30 years ago. This oblique image of 0.1 mpx has no commercial value. Reproduction prohibited.

• The photo of Dirac and Feynman is from the Caltech Photo Archive. This photo was taken by Marek Holzman during the International Conference on Relativity Theory of Gravitation in Warsaw (Poland) on July 25-31 1962, organized by Leopold Infeld. The image of Jesus and Nicodemus is from "The Picture Bible" (David C. Cook Publishing Co., Elgin, Illinois, U.S.A., 1978).

• Click here for my home page.