Vernissage

I didn’t know what a vernissage was until I was invited by a fellow student of my French teacher to attend the opening of an art exhibition. Cees had been to a few in The Netherlands and he said it was a chance to see the paintings, meet the artist(s) and get a free glass of wine. Well how could I refuse, I mean how could I refuse the opportunity to meet great artists etc etc.

Since we have become more involved with the community and the local artists and artisans, we seem to get more and more of these invites. Sometimes the “art”, if you can even call it that, is dreadful and sometimes it can be very interesting, some are tiny events and some are huge, at one we were even entertained by a small theatre group who had created a piece especially for the occasion, in any case they are always interesting and you get to meet more and more of the local colour.

Friday evening was the first vernissage of a new local talent who was showing his work along with seven other fellow artists. I couldn’t refuse to go, after all don’t forget the free glass of wine don’t forget how interesting it will be to meet all the artists and see their work, well actually I had to supply some of the nibbles, so after making nearly 70 mini-samosas off I went into Cormatin.

The Master of Ceremonies Alain Michaud (a well established artist in his own right who held a vernissage a couple of weeks ago in a lovely old Romanesque church not far from Tournus) introduced the artists one by one, explaining their work and then the chap’s work I had come to see was introduced “And here is the work of a new artist who has been painting for less than a year, Monsieur Cees van Alderen”, lots of oohs and aahs and approving nods from the audience and so they should be impressed, his work is quite amazing for someone who first picked up a brush last September.

Then after our free glass(es) of wine and nibbles we left for home and a takeaway pizza to celebrate a successful evening. Now all we have to do is wait for the millions to roll in !

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