Friday, June 8, 2012

Sennelier and Art Materials


My trip journals begin before the trip. One of my pre-trip rituals is to gather materials, to try things out.
 
In childhood, pencils, crayons and paper were my only dear art materials, Then came my first thrilling visit to a real art shop to buy colors with exotic names such as Cadmium Red and Burnt Umber. I still swoon at the smell of Crayolas (invented in 1903!) and the sight of that gold and green box.
A most exciting art shop: Sennelier in Paris. Reasons: The colors of the displayed materials and the lovely building itself. 
 
From Sennelier website. To go there, click here.
The history. Started in 1887!
The location on Quay Voltaire in Paris, across from the Louvre. Oh, là!!!

The little events that happen inside.

In April, I was waiting at the counter. A young man was agonizing over about 10 Prismacolors. He talked  to himself as he arranged and re-arranged them. He would put 3 together, then 3 others, over and over. I smiled with empathy. In can be hard to choose in any case, but at Sennelier, the Prismacolors are double the price of US, and that’s not counting the exchange rate. I never learned where he was from, or what language he spoke. I did say to him, “C’est difficile à chosir, n’est-ce pas?”. "It's difficult to choose, no?" He never looked up, he kept on shuffling. Later I drew the scene from memory. Artists and their materials, n'est-ce pas?

1 comment:

Thank you for your comments! They mean a lot to me!