Normandy and Monet's Garden
gardens, thatched cottages and the D-Day beaches...
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DATES: June 14 - 24, 2009 (10 nights). LED BY: Barbara van Zanten |
Most Americans have heard of the French region called Normandy, mainly because of its association with the D-Day landings of World War II. Utah, Omaha Juno, Gold and Sword beaches and the cemeteries for the American soldiers who fell during the landings, form part of a well beaten tourist path along the Norman coast in the region known as Calvados. Normandy however, has other, more peaceful claims to fame. It is an ancient and historical region that has witnessed countless important events. From the Viking occupation of Norse men that gave the region its name; through William the Conqueror and Joan of Arc down to its importance in the Second World War; its towns, villages and landscapes echo with the ghosts of the past. Though many places were severely damaged during the war, most of its medieval town centers, villages, churches and cathedrals survived intact or were rebuilt after the war exactly in their original form. Normandy is a large region separated into two sub-region: Upper Normandy which is found to the north-east of the Seine River, and Lower Normandy which lies to the south-west. Its wet winters, mild temperatures and warm summers favor the growth of grass, trees, and flowers, and the overall color palette is green, green and more green, along with the blue of the sea and the white of the enormous puffy clouds that race across the immense skies. As a result of the climate Normandy is a land of rich pastures and meadows and several of France’s most famous gardens are found there including the most famous of all, Monet's Garden at Giverny. Punctuating this lush landscape is a photogenic collection of of romantic farmhouses, ancient historical sites and well ordered villages complete with half-timbered facades, stone church spires and large manor houses. Pick up will be at Roissy Charles-de-Gaulle airport, and on our way to Normandy we will stop in Auvers-sur-Oise to stretch our legs while meditating at the grave site of Vincent van Gogh, who surely would have be a Photoshop guru if he were alive today. We will ask St. Kodak the patron saint of photographers, to grant us a successful trip and keep the rain away. Van Gogh lived and died in this village and is buried next to his brother Theo in the village churchyard. For the first part of our tour we will be based in Calvados, an area above all others that captures the character, charm and historical drama of this seductive region. Calvados is a secretive land providing endless soft-focus vignettes of nostalgic France. Outside the small towns we will find a rural idyll of half-timbered farms hidden in fertile valleys among wooded hillsides, and surrounded by old orchards. The deep roads and lanes sink between fields enclosed by ancient, well-tended hedgerows. It is a seriously lush and green land with vast ever changing skies. The orchards are rich and full of dappled, big-eyed cows munching in knee-high buttercup meadows beneath laden apple boughs. The scattered, vast, half-timbered barns and farmhouses, in filled with earth-red brick or honey-colored clay, sit contentedly creaking and weary with use and age, while sturdy Norman country folk go about their daily business. The seductive outlines of an elegant, checkerboard manor house glimpsed at the end of an avenue of lime trees lends a note of prosperity and order. Many houses have delightful gardens that will be at their best at this time in June. Our accommodation for this part of the tour will be at a three-star hotel of charm and character only minutes away from the D-Day Beaches of the Normandy coast. Housed in a 13th century fortified manor house, the hotel is situated in a peaceful village in "William the Conqueror Country", for it was from here that he launched the invasion of England in 1066. From this succulent region comes bounties of cider, butter, cream and cheeses. The locals prevent heart attacks by regular shots of Calvados; the fiery brandy distilled from apples. On our itinerary will be several half timbered manor houses and dainty chateaux - some with moats and swans; thatched cottages; water mills, romantic landscapes; pretty villages with half-timbered houses adorned with flowers; and two renowned gardens: the Canon gardens at Mezidon, famous for its vistas, alleys and statues, and the Jardin du Pays d’Auge an enchanting collection of romantic garden rooms with statues, tiny pathways, thatched cottages and flower beds all arranged in a most harmonious manner. Also on our itinerary will be a day-long visit to Mont St. Michel, France’s second most visited monument (Eiffel Tower is the first) and a great place for black and white moody shots. We will also pay a sunrise visit to the fortified medieval fishing port of Honfleur, the birthplace of Impressionism and one of the prettiest coastal towns in Normandy, and perhaps spend an hour or two at Deauville, a uniquely old fashioned seaside town.. We cannot visit this part of Normandy in this the 65th anniversary year of the D-Day landings without paying homage to the courageous soldiers who died during the Battle of Normandy which started on June 6, 1944. This date was the start of ten months of bloody and brave fighting that finally freed Europe from the Nazis' fascist occupation. The beaches of Utah, Omaha, Juno and Sword were the destinations of the biggest invasion fleet ever assembled and are less than twenty minutes away from our hotel. We will spend a day with a local guide and expert, visiting the sites of what surely must be the most remarkable battle of all time. Only when seeing the beaches and the cliffs can we appreciate the enormous task that those soldiers faced and why so many were killed. We will also visit the Musee de Debarquement , and the American cemetery near Omaha beach where over 9,000 soldiers are buried in a well ordered graveyard that cannot fail to move even the most jaded heart. "Apart from painting and gardening, I'm not good at anything," ...Claude Monet For the second part of our tour we will be based in a river side hotel in Upper Normandy. The low, dramatic Norman skies, lush rolling pastures, beautiful river valleys and seaside villages were the inspiration for the group of artists known as the Impressionists, who were fascinated by the special quality of the light and the abundance of vegetation. It is not for nothing that Normandy was chosen by many artists as their “outdoor atelier”, as it has a nostalgic, romantic quality not found anywhere else in France. The first impressionists, Eugene Boudin and Claude Monet were both Normans and the Normandy portrayed in their paintings still exists in spite of the modernization of the 20th and 21st centuries. In 1883 Monet, the most famous Impressionist of all, bought a house in a tiny village called Giverny in Upper Normandy near the river Seine about an hour north of Paris. Finding inspiration for his paintings in flowers and water lilies, he developed his garden over the next thirty years and he considered it to be one of his greatest works of art. Most of his famous paintings of flowers and water lilies were painted in the garden and each year more than half a million people come from all over the world to see the descendants of his water lilies floating under his famous Japanese bridge. Not for us, however, the crowds of tourists blocking our view of the water-lilies. We will visit the gardens on a Monday, when the gardens are closed to the general public and open only by prior arrangement to artists and photographers. All year round the flowerbeds radiate intense seasonal color. Hundreds of different species of flowers, perennials, shrubs, and trees grow there in a seemingly uncontrolled profusion and over 100,000 annuals are planted and replaced each year. It is truly a masterpiece of a garden, and each time we visit the palette of colors is different to the time before, moving from the whites and purples of spring into the pinks and reds of summer and the golds, rusts and yellows of autumn. On Mondays, artists, both professional and amateur set up their easels all over the gardens, and photographers can shoot over their shoulders, capturing the painting and the garden at the same time. You may even end up buying one of the paintings fresh off the easel and still wet. Photograph the famous Japanese bridge, the lily pond, the central allée covered with roses, the pink house with green shutters, the gardeners, and of course the flowers and shrubs. We will also explore the charming unspoilt village of Giverny itself, as our accommodations for this part of our tour will be only ten minutes away. Also on this part of our itinerary will be some of this region’s most beautiful villages, rich in rose clad half-timbered houses - including Gerberoy, a picture-book village classified as "one of the Most Beautiful Villages of France". Gerberoy is a charming mixture of half-timbered houses some covered with roses, some with gardens bursting with flowers of all kinds. Shutters are painted in subtle pastel colors, the alleyways are cobbled in golden stone Normandy is the ideal region for photographers interested in capturing the romantic, painterly images beloved of the Impressionists. With flowers in profusion, beautiful cottages, lush gardens and soft landscapes, Normandy is both alluring and very photogenic. If the sun shines we have the dappled sunlight Monet loved, but if we have rain we can also obtain moody dramatic black and white images. We will also find time to create one of our legendary still-life set-ups...perhaps even in Monet's garden itself. Our last visit to Normandy was a painterly photography workshop ten years ago. For a few of the beautiful painterly images by participants in our 1999 painterly photography workshop to Normandy click here. We think it is high time to revisit Normandy's painterly charms. |
for Barbara's Polaroid manipulations from Normandy click here.. |
