la cérémonie d’ouverture des Jeux olympiques 🎉

 

Terry said, ”You’ll have a ringside seat living on the quai” 

In fact I did! 🎉 🎉🎉

Piaf et Brassai

October 11th marked the 50th anniversary of Edith Piaf's passing.
 

She was a Belleville girl, supposedly born in the hallway at #72 rue de Belleville a few blocks away from me.

The le petit Piaf/sparrow was a great one for exaggerating the details of her life.
 

The windows of Belleville were full of Piaf biographies
 

The walls full of Piaf homage murals
 

A grand concert was held in the square under the eglise Saint-Jean-Babtiste de Belleville with full marching band.

Everyone was singing along on all her songs though it was too crowded for me.
 

Over on 182 rue saint Honore an exhibit of the collection of souvenirs from the Bibliotheque Nationale including her petite robe noire. Is Piaf the originator of our little black dress?

Yesterday was the first day of the Brassai photography exhibit at the Hotel de Ville. This woman, perfectly dressed for both Brassai and Piaf wearing head-to-toe black plus a slash of red lipstick.
 

Back to Piaf but these exhibits overlap don't you think? Are you a fan of both stars? How not to be if you love Paris...

The accordion will always be an icon of Paris and Piaf. It's still played daily in the hallways and onboard the Metro.
 

Piaf's little accordion...

On the first day at Brassai the lines are just forming. Everyone looks a bit drenched... Hey It's drizzly Paris!
 

As reflected in Brassai's amazing photos.

A somewhat more glamorous scene backstage at the ballet with les petites rats and an older admirer.
 

Artist model Kiki of Montparnass and her chums and pets.
 

Brassai clearly loved to shoot Paris at night
 

Getting off bus #96 at Hotel de Ville I couldn't resist the reflections on the Seine. Paris at night is divine.

Patisserie Demoncy-Vergne of Belleville created an homage to Piaf. "Le Tourbillon de la Mome" La Vie en Rose as a religieuse? Shouldn't someone create a dessert especially for Brassai? Would it be licorice/reglisse black? I'm off to the Salon du chocolat at Chateau Vaux le Vicomte today, but first a dunk in the pool. The Brassai exhibit is on until 4 March 2014 at Hotel de Ville.

Come see it!
 

Piaf and My Second Cousin

I was surprised Monday morning, to see an ad for La Vie En Rose in my sidebar!

On the flight over to France I saw A Good Year, an adorable film that takes place in Provence. Marion Cotillard plays the female lead, sought after by Russell Crowe. I'd planned to see La Vie en Rose in Paris, not knowing Cotillard also plays Edith Piaf..

My cousin K. (really my second cousin) lives in Pigalle and I knew she'd want to see the Edith Piaf movie. K. always dresses in blue, always wears a blue beret like a true Frenchie... She's tiny and a bit of a "piaf" (slang for sparrow) herself.

She saw many Piaf concerts and attended Piaf's last, final concert. K. knows all the songs.

My cousin has a Tea Cup Yorkie...another little piaf / sparrow called Punchy. We did get to see La Vie En Rose together (it was called La Mome in Paris, slang for "the kid"). It was in French with no subtitles. Still at the end, I cried buckets and my cousin sang the La Vie en Rose song... On the flight home I got to see La Vie en Rose with subtitles and watched it 3 more times. My cousin was born in Poland. Her motto is, Carpe Diem.

Piu Piu - Pylônes - Piaf

The little guy sitting on the dollhouse sewing machine is called Piu Piu. He comes from Pylônes in Paris. Piu Piu is the nickname for little bird in France and Brazil and similar to our Tweedi Bird character.

If you're crazy, nuts for goofy chatchkes go to Pylônes.

There are 5 Pylônes shops in Paris, 6 in Japan and 2 in NYC.

I spotted Piu Piu in the window of the Marais' Pylônes on 13 rue St Croix de la Bretonnerie and it was instant love. I fell for the one on the upper left because of his complementary coloring and he was damn cute. A cook book author, was wearing this baublely illustrated necklace at a James Beard House event 10 years ago - I was a house photographer there for 7+ years. Each epoxy resin globe has silly illustrations inside: numbers, dog muzzles, faces, star fish, monkey twins etc. Next trip over I went to their tiny closet-size shop in Galerie Vivienne and got the necklace, earings, bracelet. I passed on the ring.

I've always had a thing for sparrows. They flit about when I walk to the pool at 7am and yack outside my window even earlier. So Piu Piu was an easy addition to my collection of what-nots.

When you bring home a new pet you should know something about him...
I didn't know this little guy was a working bird.
I didn't know he was a magnet for paperclips and straight pins until I wrote this post. I didn't know he would chirp non-stop once out of his box. See the white paper tab sticking out of the bird's bottom in the 2nd picture?
Pull the white tab -> the chirping begins.
I didn't know he was created by artist, Ionel Panaït a Romanian designer living in France.

Piu Piu is a chirping color wheel for me.
He's made up of 2 sets of complimentary colors.
RED + GREEN or/ RED + TURQUOISE a similar combo
YELLOW + PURPLE
The 3rd set BLUE + ORANGE is missing on this little guy but I can live with that. Here's a watercolor tip for those inclined - When you mix 2 complimentary colors together you'll get some very handsome GREYS..much better than using Paynes grey or Davy's grey straight out of the tube.

Piu Piu, watercolor, 12 x 10"

Painting Piu Piu is an ongoing project for me. Here he is next to my La Vaissellerie tea pot. French customs stopped me leaving Charles de Gaulle airport for New York. I thought it was Piu Piu, chirping away in my purse like mad, but I'd forgotten to get rid of an AirFrance fork I'd snagged on the trip over. They didn't make much of a fuss and just giggled about Piu Piu. He can be useful at customs too. A working bird.

The "Little Sparrow" or Petit Moineau has a new movie about her, LA VIE EN ROSE which means the sweet life). It's named after one of Piaf's most loved songs. The words in French are ( here. And in English as sung by Louis Armstrong are here.