Friday, February 12, 2021

Art imitates life

That's what I called this photo back in 2006 when I took it. It was a sunny and warm May day. Our friend Sue from California was visiting and we took her to see Loches. We visited the old donjon, the church of Saint-Ours, and the renaissance château, and we walked around in the city center for a while.

The Tour St.-Antoine, Loches, in real life and as seen by 19th century painter Emmanuel Lansyer.
Photo from May 2006.

It's difficult to make out what the words below the painting say. The first line might read un amoureux du Lochois (one who loves the region of Loches). And I think the last line might end with ...peint en 1889 (painted in 1889), but I can't be sure.

After I wrote this, I did some extensive quick and dirty research on line and I think I found the painting. It seems to be the work of Emmanuel Lansyer (the big white letters on the poster probably spell out "Lansyer") who lived between 1835 and 1893, and it was indeed painted in 1889. A museum of Lansyer's works exists in Loches, not far from the royal residence where I took this photo.

2 comments:

  1. Oh, I like this! Auvers-sur-Oise has done a similar thing with Van Gogh’s paintings at the sites where he painted them.

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  2. bettyann, I'm not sure this was permanent, but I haven't been back recently enough to know.

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