Cherries from Chauvet's Orchard
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RUTH PHILLIPS Cherries from Chauvet’s Orchard A M emoir Red Ochre Press First published 2011 by Red Ochre Press Hameau des Couguieux 84410 Bedoin, France www.RedOchrepress.com Copyright © 2011 Ruth Phillips For Louis Joseph Alassane Merrow-Smith The right of Ruth Phillips to be identified as the author of this work has born Bamako, 2010 been asserted in accordance with Section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers. This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser Dépot Legal Juin 2011 A CIP catalog record is available for this book from the British Library A CIP catalog record is available for this book from the Library of Congress ISBN 978-2-9534500-1-9 Front cover painting: ‘Chauvet’s orchard, spring’ by Julian Merrow-Smith http://shiftinglight.com Painting Titles Introduction 1 Oignons Doux 3 Pale Blue Iris 11 House with Lavender Field 15 Two Pomegranates 20 Boats at Carry-le-Rouet 24 Fishing Boats, Cassis 27 Still Life with Summer Fruits 30 Palette Knife 35 Portrait of a Woman 39 Still Life with Autumn Fruits 44 Two Red Pears and an Apple 49 Chantecler 52 Mont Ventoux from Les Couguieux 55 Moonrise over the Mont Ventoux 59 Red and Gold 63 Poppy Bank 66 The Key 70 Cherries from M.Chauvet’s Orchard 73 Three Cherries on a White Cloth 77 Turnips from our Garden 80 Vines and Rain 84 Old Grenache 86 Saucisson and Bread 90 Giudecca Sunrise 95 Dusk, Grand Canal 98 Approaching Rain 102 Autumn on the Rhone 106 Walnuts 111 Grapes and Fresh Walnuts 115 Ochre Cliffs and a Patch of Blue 118 House with Blue Shutters 122 Quince Tree, Vines and Storm 129 Quince Half 133 Still Life with Peeled Clementine 134 The Truffle Orchard 136 Who knew an egg could have eight different colors in its shell? Rougets - Two Little Fish 141 Tracy Dale, librarian, New Jersey, USA Flake White 147 Single Malt 153 After the Rain 158 C 159 Cloud Shadows 160 Night Lemon 163 Espresso and Silver Spoon 167 Oyster Shell and Cup 170 Mozart Letters and Daisy 173 Boats at Amalfi 175 Lemon 179 Apple and Goat’s Cheese 183 Woman in a White Dress 187 Daffodils in a Jam Jar 192 Postcard 195 La Calenque de Sormiou 199 Pêche Blanche 202 Abandoned House with Poppy Field 205 Bank of Wildflowers 209 Daffodil on a Tile 215 Lemon and Orange on a French Cloth 217 Night Moon 222 Balsamic Bottle, Jug and Shallot 226 Pinasses on the River Niger 227 Introduction Introduction ‘Far away in the heavenly abode of the great god Indra, there is n February 16, 2005, Julian Merrow-Smith painted a wonderful net which has been hung by some cunning artificer Oan oyster. It was 12 by 14 centimetres, about the size of in such a manner that it stretches out infinitely in all directions. a postcard. A year and 362 small paintings later, an article In accordance with the extravagant tastes of deities, the artifi- about the painter and his project appeared in the New York cer has hung a single glittering jewel in each “eye”of the net, Times. Six months after that Julian’s mailing list had grown and since the net itself is infinite in dimension, the jewels are from three to three thousand and each painting was selling infinite in number. There hang the jewels, glittering like stars before it was even dry. of the first magnitude, a wonderful sight to behold. If we now I became Julian’s assistant by default. It was I who wrote arbitrarily select one of these jewels for inspection and look names and addresses—Hitchcockian, Irvingesque, or straight closely at it, we will discover that in its polished surface there out of Laura Ingalls Wilder—on the packages, handed them are reflected all the other jewels in the net, infinite in number. over to Vincent at the Bedoin post office and watched as the Not only that, but each of the jewels reflected in this one jewel paintings began their journeys toward streets and towns with is also reflecting all the other jewels, so that there is an infinite overtones of cider, coyote, guitars and lox, and it was while reflecting process occurring.’ I was doing this that the seed for this book was planted. Francis H. Cook, In October 2008 the Guardian newspaper ran a small Hua-Yen Buddhism: the Jewel Net of Indra, headline in its Shortcuts section: ‘The thousandth Postcard Pennsylvania State University Press, 1977 from Provence could be yours... ’ It felt like a milestone. At the time I was in Lille. I was playing The Marriage of Figaro at night and trying to write a book during the day. I had been toying with various forms—letters, blog, memoir, fiction—and I was bored. With me, with him, with us, and with lavender. I wanted my story to connect to something larger, but it refused. It was then that I had an idea. I would write to everyone on Julian’s mailing list and ask them to 1 Cherries From Chauvet’s Orchard Oignons Doux tell me who they were, what their landscape was like and how the paintings fit into their lives, as prints or originals, framed or unframed, on a bookshelf, a computer screen or a wall. To my amazement, I received hundreds of replies. In part, then, this is the story of a man who, when I married him, called himself a painter but rarely painted. A man who followed a dream and moved to Provence, and Oignons Doux who now paints every day. More than that, however, this is a story about communities. First, a community of painters both amateur and professional who, enabled by the Inter- We farm in the San Joaquin Valley of California and this is net, faced their demons, took up their brushes and started a one of our crops. The painting that I purchased—Oignons daily painting practice. Second, a community of people who, Doux - was timed to arrive with the harvest of our own for some reason, signed up to receive a painting every day onions. via email from Provence. To do justice to these people and Janet Thompson, Buttonwillow, California, USA the stories they told me, I would have to compile a separate book. In this one, meanwhile, the jewels that I have plucked from them reflect, I hope, the beauty of the project, just as ulian struggled up the hill to his rented studio in the project itself reflects their beauty. Jthe village of Crillon le Brave. When he first arrived in France, he would have nipped up in third gear but now, in his early forties and somewhat portlier, he was down to first and straining. Tied to the back of his bike were three bottles of Badoit and a five-litre box ofvin de pays, and out of his panniers poked a bunch of paintbrushes and a baguette, both nubbin ends of which had been eaten. Inside the left pannier were three carefully chosen onions, two of which he intended to paint and one of which he would use to make a potato curry later that day. Letting the bike fall against the curb, Julian opened the front door to the studio and checked the post. This consisted of two envelopes: a gentle reminder of the three months’ rent still due and an invitation from the local town hall to show his landscapes in a street festival three villages away. He ignored the first, believing it to be the privilege of the artist 2 3 Cherries From Chauvet’s Orchard Oignons Doux to pay his rent when he is moved to do so, and considered The original layout of the interior was odd, even inhos- the second. Then he crumpled them both into a ball and pitable. The ground floor was a single room with cold, reso- threw them on the pile of papers by the heavy front door. He nant, busy concrete tiles. Here Julian hung a collection of pulled his bicycle inside, propped it against several unfinished his still lifes and landscapes. Since the front door was always canvasses and, humming the Lion’s song from The Wizard open passers-by, lured by a menacing portrait in the window, of Oz, climbed the staircase to the studio in which he had could peruse the paintings at their leisure. He called this lived alone for six years. room the gallery. Crillon was a dreamy place perched high above vine- Branching off the staircase was the first floor, also only yards, olive groves and cherry orchards, with a honey- one room, a kitchen/dining room. This was the room where coloured stone arch, cobbled streets, a well and a church Julian cooked, ate and painted. A room in which turps and spire. In season, it bulged with Parisians, Belgians, Ameri- jam jars, linen canvas and linen napkins, basting and paint- cans and Swiss whose second homes creaked open after eight ing brushes, and tubes of anchovy paste and titanium white months of being battered and frozen by the mistral.