“Things aren’t what they used to be”… It’s a common lament these days as people stroll down the historic rue des Rosiers, the heart of the Jewish quarter (known as the “Pletzl”) in the Marais.

We often associate Aix-en-Provence with the celebrated painter, Paul Cézanne, possibly because he painted so often at Vauvenargues close by. But, another notable artist came from the same place. The great writer, Emile Zola, was not only from Aix, but went to school with Cézanne and at 13, they even became close friends.

In 17th century France, the word ‘farmer’ had more elaborate definitions. Here, they referred to the people who farmed or collected taxes for the king. Furthermore, it has been suggested that many of these important people collected much more than they delivered to the crown.

There is little doubt as to the greatness of Henri Matisse as a Fauvist painter. He did indeed paint like a “wild beast” for many years. But when did this start and how was the message carried around the world?

There are heroes in many walks of life. No, I don’t mean war heroes; at least not today. My purpose is to turn your attention to the only French woman awarded two Nobel Prizes including one for physics which she shared with her husband, Pierre, and Antoine Becquerel in 1903. She and her husband discovered the source of two radioactive substances -- radium and polonium -- the latter named after her native Poland. Madame Curie continued her work and by 1911 she had isolated radium and studied its chemical properties. For this she received her second Nobel Prize for chemistry.

Think of 1920’s music and New Orleans comes to mind, as do the jazz clubs of New York and Chicago. But to understand the impact this music had on the world after WWI we have to look at Paris and the flowering of American music in this post war city.

The French always do them well, especially the milestone commemorations every five years of the liberation of their country from Nazi occupation during World War II. But this year, on June 6th, the ceremonies marking the 65th anniversary of the 1944 Allied D-Day landings on the beaches of Normandy that began that liberation will have special and touching significance.

There are few people who haven't heard the name: Gertrude Stein, the American writer who lived in France from before WWI until she died in Paris in 1946. She made 27 rue de Fleurus, near the Luxembourg Gardens in Paris, famous. Everybody who was anybody met there on Saturday nights to discuss art and literature. But there are other places to see here effigy or walk the paths of her French homes.

The name Kees Van Dongen should be known to anyone who appreciates the Fauvist movement of Paris after the turn of the twentieth century. He was born in Rotterdam (1877). By 1897 he had completed his studies and by 1899, he settled in Paris where he worked as a house painter and an illustrator for satirical magazines which, for a while, afforded him a basic income.