Berlin & Paris

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Berlin: Die Sinfonie der Großstadt, 1927 (see DrMabuseDerSpieler for more)


A rather more conservative travel film of Paris in the 1920's (part 2; see travelfilmarchive for more).

I've been to Paris once; to Berlin, at least 5 times. Some people claim that you have to choose between France and Germany, you can't keep both (as lovers??), but it would be lovely if Paris could give me a chance again. I'm sure Berlin won't mind, she loves Paris, too.
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Strike Is Begun In Paris Theatres

News from Paris 88 years ago, found in The New York Times (October 18, 1920)

Actors and Stage Hands follow the Example of the Opera Personnel.
STARTED BY AUTHORS' UNION
Actors Espouse the Cause of Young Playwrights, Who Say Managers Have Boycotted Them.

[Being a bit of an anarcho-syndicalist at heart, I find the French tradition of strikes somehow endearing and encouraging. Here in Scandinavia, workers on all levels tend to take their rights for granted, and do not always realize that they are the result of blood, sweat and tears of many generations before us.]

The decision to strike was take at a secret meeting of the State Federation Committee yesterday, but it was then too late to put it into operation at more than one or two theatres. At one, the Dejazet Theatre, notice was received early, and the curtain never rose. The audience waited for a quarter of an hour and then became impatient. Behind the scenes hot discussion and argument were going on, and, seeing that there was no other way out of the difficulty, the manager announced to the audience that there would be no performance and that money would be returned at the door.

[One can only imagine the response he got from an average crowd of disappointed Parisians. Of course, the drawback of striking is the public inconvenience, which is (in France's case) almost proverbial in Europe.]

At the Cluny Theatre matters were more advanced when the strike began. The play was in the middle of the second act when the order was received, and at one, disregarding the audience entirely, actors, stage hands and the whole personnel decided to quit the theatre. Immediately the curtain was rung down, and for some minutes the audience was left wondering what had happened. Soont he playgoers grew restless [...] Men brandished their sticks at the stage, on which the manager stood alone trying to explain what had happened, and the shrill criticism of women deprived of their pleasure drowned his words. It needed several police officers and a speech from the Police Commissioner to clear the theatre, and some actors and actresses were subjected to a good deal of rough treatment.

[Oh lala, "shrill" women deprived of their "pleasure"... can't have that, can we? This was a strike in support of a union of authors, which had been treated unfairly by the leading organization of dramatic authors, probably an older, guild-like organization. Andy would approve this kind of solidarity between unions. I wonder if he would try to persuade Mayann and Lou to join the strike. He certainly wishes that they would join a union, maybe the IWW, where all kinds of workers are welcome, or start their own.]

La minute heureuse

Lyckans minut, originally uploaded by punalippu.

Another discovered French Art Deco artist from Kjell Strömberg's nostalgic "Paris i närbild" (1934).

Jean Dulac (1902-1968)

Born in Lyon, France. Worked as a painter, sculptor, and illustrator. Studied at the Beaux-Arts, Paris. As a printmaker, Jean Dulac produced copper engravings, etchings, and pochoirs. For erotic works, Dulac used a pseudonym, Jean de l'Étang.

A l'ombre du Sacre Coeur

I skuggan av Sacre Coeur, originally uploaded by punalippu.

In the shadow of Sacre Coeur, drawing by Roger de Valerio (1886-1951).

Petit curriculum vitae d'artiste (because it is almost impossible to find info on the net):

Né à Lille, il fait des études d'architecture aux Beaux-Arts à Paris.
1911-1914 : directeur artistique du journal Le Matin
1917 : Il entre chez l'éditeur de musique Salabert, où, jusqu'en 1924,
il réalise plus de 2 000 couvertures.
1926 : conseiller artistique chez Devambez
1932 :à la tête du journal Le Rire
1936-1940 : directeur associé des Editions Perceval
1933 : Il donne des cours à l'Ecole technique de publicité
1940 : Il se retire à Belle-Île et se consacre à la peinture (nus et fleurs), puis à l'illustration de livre (le Surmâle de Jarry)

Picture from Swedish author Kjell Strömberg's Paris i närbild (1934)

Parisian Hat

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Just had to add this portrait to the series of Yosano Akiko posts. Yosano bought the hat in Paris in 1912.

La Siréne des tropiques

From Josephine Baker's first movie, La Siréne des Tropiques (1927). Josephine played a native girl on a generic tropical island, who falls in love with the young French engineer played by Pierre Batcheff.
Found in an interesting article by Ylva Habel, film historian: To Stockholm, with Love: The Critical Reception of Josephine Baker, 1927-35

"If we adjust our tastes to those of the lower races, it will be the downfall of our culture," thundered an anonymous "letter to the Editor" in Stockholms Dagblad (23 July 1928), when Josephine Baker appeared in person on a Swedish stage for the first time in history. Another preached: "Don't we have enough leg-shows and flirtation in [Ernst] Rolf's and Karl Gerhard's revues [...]? … is there no longer any prohibition in Sweden against showing a woman's entire torso?" They did not stand unchallenged:

Why should our delight over the encounter with this deeply natural human being be interpreted as a sign of the depravation of our times?
[...] those who have the capacity to live in the present and to love its art forms, and in the best cases, its deep sense of decorum, should be glad to have known Josephine Baker, the international stage revue's most loveable child of nature.
(Signed 'Unbiased Theologian' - sounds like Falco, doesn't it!)

The confused but intrigued Stockholmers imagined Josephine as an unspoiled child of nature, although there were years of hard work behind her stage persona and performance. In the 30's, when she developed her look in a more divalike, chansonette-singer direction, some critics accused her of being crafty and manipulative (and indirectly admitted that she was an intelligent adult!). It is sad to note that even her most ardent admirers were affected by exotism that overlaps racism. It is difficult to find articles that gave a "human" image of her as an independent person capable of rational decisions and smart career moves without condemning her for crossing some invisible limit of acceptability.
What I find most interesting is how some reviewers depicted her as a messenger of continental European civilization to a peripheral, puritanical North. For these reviewers, she was not just a charming "primitive" - she was a symbol of Paris, city of lights. And that is exactly what she would become during her long career.

Rohrpost!

...so lesen sich die Liebesbriefe von Franz Kafka, die er 1920 seiner Freundin Milena schrieb, wie ein Relikt aus längst vergangenen Tagen: "Komme ich nach Wien, schreibe ich Dir einen Rohrpostbrief", ließ der Dichter seine Liebste wissen. Und: "Hast Du Donnerstag noch keinen Rohrpostbrief, dann bin ich nach Prag gefahren."

More about pneumatic tubes: In Paris, in Prague, in London and other cities.