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The disappointed artist

16th February 2007 by Helena 2 Comments  

I am in Paris filming for Tonight with Trevor McDonald (ITV 8pm this evening if you’re bored). As it’s the school holidays I am with my daughter Bea (aged 6) and my stepdaughter Julia (aged 12). I decided that I would introduce them to the museums of Paris (as well as the shops) so on the way up on the train I showed them the Musee d’Orsay website and a couple of Van Goghs.

“He’s not better than me,” said Bea, who is the artist in the family.

There was also much talk of the Eiffel Tower (or the Scary Tower) as Bea has nick-named it. In the taxi from the station we all tried desperately to be the first to see it. Julia won, Bea seemed unable to grasp that it was in the sky and kept asking if random bridges or buildings were it.

After a successful trip to the Bon Marche (why is it department stores in Paris are so elegant, how do they do that?) we walked up the rue du Bac to the Musee d’Orsay. I spent a lot of my childhood being dragged around museums so am a firm believer in deciding what you want to see and then going to see that. If you then want to stay on, fine. So it was to the Degas and the Van Gogh rooms we headed.

L'Eglise d'AuversDegas passed off without incident. The girls loved the dancers and I was thrilled to be the first to show them a Degas. Then we came to van Gogh. In front of the painting of L’Eglise d’Auvers Bea started weeping.

“I’ll never be able to paint like that,” she wailed, much to the amazement of other on-lookers.

She took a lot of consoling. We even had to phone her father who told her that of course she would be able to paint like Van Gogh, it was only a matter of time. Eventually she got over it and we spent a freezing evening on the Eiffel Tower; me scared, the girls over-joyed.

As I write Bea is busy copying a reproduction of the van Gogh that sent her into such turmoil. And I have to say, she’s doing a pretty good job of it, although I’m not sure how she’s going to copy that deep blue sky with just a packet of twelve felt-tips.

Today we are going to the Louvre – heaven knows how she’ll react when she sees the Mona Lisa but I’m just going to have to risk it.

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2007


Filed Under: Children, France, blog --> Tagged With: artist, disappointed

2 thoughts on The disappointed artist

  • spymum says:
    16th February 2007 at 1:30 pm

    Give Trevor McDoughnut a kiss on the cheek for me!

    And wow – your Bea is amazing. And only 6!? Art school beckons! And maybe a spell at the Courtald?!

  • snusmormor says:
    16th February 2007 at 7:04 pm

    I bet Trevor is prickly! Bea will probably outdo both Degas and van Gogh, painting whilst balancing on a trampoline and singing and dancing, whilst holding an amusing monologue with herself!

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Helena Frith Powell was born in Sweden to a Swedish mother and Italian father, but grew up mainly in England. She is the author of eleven books, translated into several languages including Chinese and Russian. She wrote the French Mistress column The Sunday Times about life in France for several years. She is a regular contributor to the Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday, The Times, Daily Telegraph, Tatler Magazine and Harper’s Bazaar.

Helena has been the editor of four magazines, including M Magazine, a supplement for the Abu Dhabi based National Newspaper and FIVE, a high-end fashion glossy, also published in Abu Dhabi. Helena was also editor in chief of 360 Life, a quarterly glossy magazine published with the Sports 360 Newspaper in Dubai, part of the Chalhoub Group.

Helena contributes regularly to UK-based newspapers and magazines and holds a Masters in Creative Writing from the University of Cambridge. Helena is also working on a thriller called Thin Ice that will be published in spring 2021 as well as a novel about the relationship between Virginia Woolf and Katherine Mansfield called Sense of an Echo.

Her latest non-fiction work Smart Women Don’t Get Wrinkles came out in hardback in 2016 and in paperback in April 2018.

Helena, who was educated at Durham University, lives in the Languedoc region of France with her husband Rupert and their three children.

Bibliography

More France Please, we’re British; Gibson Square 2004

Two Lipsticks and a Lover 2005; Gibson Square (hardback)

All You Need to be Impossibly French; (US version of above) Penguin 2006

Two Lipsticks and a Lover; Arrow Books (paperback) 2007

Ciao Bella Gibson Square; (hardback) 2006

Ciao Bella Gibson Square; (paperback) 2007

So Chic! (French version of Two Lipsticks) Leduc Editions 2008 (also translated into Chinese, Russian and Thai)

More, More France; Gibson Square 2009

To Hell in High Heels; Arrow Books 2009 (also translated into Polish)

The Viva Mayr Diet; Harper Collins 2009

Love in a Warm Climate; Gibson Square 2011

The Ex-Factor; Gibson Square 2013

Smart Women Don’t Get Wrinkles; Gibson Square 2016

The Arnolfini Marriage; Amazon Kindle December 2016

Smart Women Don’t Get Wrinkles (paperback); Gibson Square spring 2018

The Longest Night; Gibson Square spring 2019

 

 

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