At the musée Toulouse-Lautrec in Albi for the exhibition “Montmartre: fin de siècle’. Nearly two hundred paintings, drawings, posters and other printed materials from the collection of David Weisman and Jacqueline Michel celebrating the avant-garde artists who lived and worked in the Montmartre area of Paris at the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth centuries.

The collection is particularly rich in the works of Henri-Gabriel Ibels, Suzanne Valadon and Théophile Steinlen, the latter much involved in producing graphics for the famous ‘Le Chat Noir’ nightclub, which form an important part of the exhibition.

Théophile Steinlen ‘Le Chat Noir’ (1896)

Théophile Steinlen Part of the frieze ‘Cats and Moons’ (c.1895)

Henri-Gabriel Ibels ‘Mensonges’ (1893)

Charles Maurin ‘Prostituée en colère’ (c.1892 – 95)

Charles Maurin ‘Loïe Fuller (robe jaune)’ (1895)

Suzanne Valadon ‘Nu assis sur un Canapé’ (1916)

Suzanne Valadon ‘La Roue’ (1916)

Suzanne Valadon ‘Bol de fruits’ (1917)

A few days in the Tarn department of southern France, exploring the region and its gastronomy from the excellent ‘L’Intangible’ at the Château de la Bousquétarié  in the village of Lempaut.

At the ‘Musique en Sol’ festival in Paunat in the Dordogne to see the internationally-renowned Italian string quartet, Quartetto di Cremona. They played a diverse programme which began with two Italian compositions, Puccini’s short but beautiful ‘Crisentemi’ elegy followed by Verdi’s String Quartet. In the second half, Shostakovich’s String Quartet no. 1 was followed by a wonderfully-played String Quartet no. 2, ‘Intimate Letters’, by Leoš Janáček. An encore from Bach’s Art of Fugue rounded off an extremely enjoyable evening.

Quartetto di Cremona

Puccini ‘ ‘Crisentemi’ movement for string quartet; Verdi ‘String Quartet in E minor’; Shostakovich ‘String Quartet no. 1 in C major’, opus 49; Janáček ‘String Quartet no. 2 ‘Intimate Letters’.