July 2016 – France “Impressionism and Gourmet Travel” Chapters 1-16: Impressionist Festival at the Rouen Museum

Date and time of visit: July 17, 2016, approximately 5:00 p.m.

The last venue of the Impressionist Festival on this trip, the Rouen Museum.

ポン・オードメールを出発して向かったのはルーアン。そういえばこの旅一番最初の目的地であった「ジュミエージュ修道院」は、ルーアン郊外にあったため、2日前に通過したばかりです。この街にあるルーアン美術館(musée des Beaux-Arts de Rouen)がノルマンディ印象派フェスティバル会場のひとつになっていました。

By the way, I stayed in Rouen for one night in 2011 when I did a tour of the most beautiful villages in France. So it’s been 5 years since my last visit. I think I chose a hotel near the cathedral at that time. I had only strolled around the cathedral, or rather arrived in the evening, so I didn’t actually have the geography of this city in my mind at all. I was surprised that the Rouen Museum was farther away from the cathedral than I expected.

By the way, I remember very well that the suburbs of Rouen were very difficult to drive because of the winding of various highways and the meandering of the Seine River around here.

Rouen is one of the relatively large cities in Normandy. The city is large. If you don’t choose a parking lot carefully, you may end up far from the museum. Fortunately, I found a large public parking lot in the square facing the museum, so I parked there.

Landscapes of the Impressionist Painters

Then we went to the venue, Rouen Museum. It was before 5 p.m. when we arrived there, but it was crowded with many visitors.

It was prohibited to take photos of the inside of the special exhibition at Rouen Museum. However, the website of the event was more or less complete, so I’ll draw the following pictures based on the website and the pamphlet I received there.

Looking at the brochure again, it seems that there was also a painting of Jeanne Foran that we had just seen. I didn’t notice it there.

The special exhibition in Rouen was, in a positive sense, a compilation of the Impressionist Festival so far, but conversely, I felt that it was somewhat less distinctive than the other venues.

However, I was impressed by the fact that Rouen was still a large museum and well-equipped with many high-quality paintings on display. There was a great variety of paintings by major impressionist painters such as Manet, Monet, Renoir, Morisot and Pissarro. As was the case at Le Havre, many of the paintings were borrowed from famous museums, including the Musee d’Orsay in Paris and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, and I think that is why the exhibition was so rich and special.

For example, the following picture used in the pamphlet is a portrait of Morisot painted by Manet, which is usually exhibited at the Orsay.

However, if you are not allowed to take photos inside the building, you can’t tell the situation well when you write your diary again later. I guess I should have taken a memo when photography was prohibited. I will reflect on this in the future.

This is the end of my visit to the Impressionist Festival related events in Normandy. However, I went to two special exhibitions related to the Impressionist Festival outside Normandy, which I will introduce in Chapter 2 and after. (End of Chapter 1, Continue to Chapter 2)