Colmar is such a lovely town that I am very surprised that I didn't hear about it earlier. It is small, but very explorable. After walking around the twin several times we still found new enjoyable things: narrow alleys, little canal with cute decorations, shops with beautiful tea set, wine, candy and handcrafts, art galleries, and even just different lightings on the ancient colorful buildings already satisfied me.
PS: It has been more than one year since my last travel blog. The knee surgery had put me down in emotion for a long time. And later I was busy at job changing. Anyway the main thing is I lost the motivation of blog writing, that was why I had stopped willfully... But visiting Colmar has brought me the passion back, and after I started writing again, I found I did enjoy it very much. However my work is pretty busy, so in future I might write short travel stories without checking the English back and forth.
The medieval town
Colmar is in Alsace area of France. As the last town to be freed in France after World War II, its nationality has been switching back and forth between France and Germany several times in the history. We found the local people working on tourist-related business normally speak both French and German, and also English. Sometimes they mixed French and German. For instance, a lady in a bakery we went said: "sechs Euro, S'il vous plaît", in which "sechs Euro" is "six Euro" in German, while "S'il vous plaît" is "please" in French. Our German colleagues told us the German Colmarian speak is a dialect close with Swiss German, but I could not either way.
Colmar is actually a city, but the most attracting part is its medieval town, which was preserved impressively well. Unlike the nearby big city Strasbourg that interesting architectures and boring concrete buildings always interlace, in Colmar, the entire old town was kept well in a consistent medieval style. Maybe there are a few buildings with baroque facades, but I hardly see any boring concrete buildings.
In the center of the town, of course there is a church: St Martin's Church. It is also called a cathedral, but according to Wikipedia, that is only because of its large size, "although Colmar had never been the seat of a bishopric". The unique thing of this cathedral is that there is a bird nest at the top. We wondered why. From an online surfing, it seems there are (or were) a lot of storks (tall white bird with long legs and a long beak, 鹳 in Chinese) in Colmar. Locals love storks and make them a symbol for Colmar. I guess that is why they made a nest for them on the cathedral.
The most beautiful place located at the south of the old town, where the canal joints into the River Lauch. It is called "little Venice". I see the similarity with Venice: water ways, colorful houses, fishing history. But the architecture styles are very different. In Colmar it is common to see half-timber houses with triangle corners, which remind me more the German style timber house rather tan French. There are quite a few restaurants along the water fronts. Even if the weather was very chilly, we enjoyed one dinner at a restaurant right above water with the help from some heating lamps on the walls.
Swans were swimming on the river. In England Swans belong to the Queen, but in French, I wonder if people treat them similar with ducks.... As a Chinese, I found French food and Chinese food my favorite, hard to say which one I like better. Both have unbeatable advantages and they have some similarities such as the wide ranges of ingredients. Duck is common for both Chinese and French food, but it is hard to find duck meat in the supermarkets in USA, UK, Austria or Germany.
Beyond the historical stuffs
Walking along the canal from the town center towards little Venice is very lovely. Not only flowers, benches and parks along the canal, but also the cute decorations above the canal that made us a good laugh.
Below picture there is a huge locust above the canal.
Colmar is in Alsace area of France. As the last town to be freed in France after World War II, its nationality has been switching back and forth between France and Germany several times in the history. We found the local people working on tourist-related business normally speak both French and German, and also English. Sometimes they mixed French and German. For instance, a lady in a bakery we went said: "sechs Euro, S'il vous plaît", in which "sechs Euro" is "six Euro" in German, while "S'il vous plaît" is "please" in French. Our German colleagues told us the German Colmarian speak is a dialect close with Swiss German, but I could not either way.
Colmar is actually a city, but the most attracting part is its medieval town, which was preserved impressively well. Unlike the nearby big city Strasbourg that interesting architectures and boring concrete buildings always interlace, in Colmar, the entire old town was kept well in a consistent medieval style. Maybe there are a few buildings with baroque facades, but I hardly see any boring concrete buildings.
In the center of the town, of course there is a church: St Martin's Church. It is also called a cathedral, but according to Wikipedia, that is only because of its large size, "although Colmar had never been the seat of a bishopric". The unique thing of this cathedral is that there is a bird nest at the top. We wondered why. From an online surfing, it seems there are (or were) a lot of storks (tall white bird with long legs and a long beak, 鹳 in Chinese) in Colmar. Locals love storks and make them a symbol for Colmar. I guess that is why they made a nest for them on the cathedral.
The most beautiful place located at the south of the old town, where the canal joints into the River Lauch. It is called "little Venice". I see the similarity with Venice: water ways, colorful houses, fishing history. But the architecture styles are very different. In Colmar it is common to see half-timber houses with triangle corners, which remind me more the German style timber house rather tan French. There are quite a few restaurants along the water fronts. Even if the weather was very chilly, we enjoyed one dinner at a restaurant right above water with the help from some heating lamps on the walls.
Swans were swimming on the river. In England Swans belong to the Queen, but in French, I wonder if people treat them similar with ducks.... As a Chinese, I found French food and Chinese food my favorite, hard to say which one I like better. Both have unbeatable advantages and they have some similarities such as the wide ranges of ingredients. Duck is common for both Chinese and French food, but it is hard to find duck meat in the supermarkets in USA, UK, Austria or Germany.
Beyond the historical stuffs
Walking along the canal from the town center towards little Venice is very lovely. Not only flowers, benches and parks along the canal, but also the cute decorations above the canal that made us a good laugh.
Below picture there is a huge locust above the canal.
That leads to my second most impressive feeling on Colmar: it is not only a historical site, it is a lively and very livable city. Locals put a lot of effort to make it a cozy place. Not only that is clean and neat, but also there are really many lovely details. Along the canal, you can see continuous funning huge "toys" of inserts or ducks etc , that is a very good example of what I meant. You can find many cute things like that in Colmar. Rough colorful balloon-like pots for plants like oldddd grape tree; Flower cages in the canal; crazy ideas of bicycle or watering pots as facades, beautiful tea sets including tea from my hometown... It is because all these lovely small things Colmar becomes so lively and charming.
A market hall built in 1865 is still in use today. This is a breathing old town with people adding new stuff while keeping its beautiful artist taste.
We stayed at a local apartment, which turn out to be a great option, as we the had the chance to see the local apartment hiding inside some courtyards behind the streets.
In my heart the best city is that it keeps the best parts during the time flowing, but always keep lively activities. When adding new functionalities, also consider the surrounding architecture and atmosphere, keep a neat and beautiful city picture. If lacking the local activity and details by the locals, even if the acitechtures look wonderful, the city is only a still antique, like my impression with Budapest. If lacking the respect to history and lacking the taste or sense to beauty, things like breaking down hundreds years old city walls might happen like for Beijing. Every time when thinking about those night city gates survived after world war II but were taken down in peaceful period, my heart feels bleeding. Anyway, to make my dreamed city, we need to respect the history, we need a good taste to maintain and update the architectures and city plan, and lively details from people who enjoy life. Colmar matches all my dreams.
Art in Colmar
There might be some hints why there are many good looking things in Colmar: in such a small town they have quite a few artist gallery and museums, including a very large one called Unterlinden Museum. It contains a 13th-century religious convent building and a 1906 former public baths building, which are connected smartly by an underground tunnel alley displaying paintings. There are also a huge collection of paintings, sculptures and artefacts (http://www.musee-unterlinden.com/en/collections/). The audio guild is include in the ticket, but the order of arts is not super well organized. There are quite a few pieces in the audio list we could not find.
In this museum, the most famous piece is an Isenheim Altarpiece (http://www.musee-unterlinden.com/en/collections-du-musee-unterlinden/the-isenheim-altarpiece/), very large with the design of multilayers so that one can decide which pieces to show in which consequences. There are many other religious painting in the collections, although I am not interested to listen to all the audio guilds on the symbols and indications of this and that on the paintings.
There is one Picasso painting (Bust of a Seated Woman, http://www.musee-unterlinden.com/en/collections/buste-de-femme/), and one Monet painting (Valley of the Creuse (Sunset) http://www.musee-unterlinden.com/en/collections/la-vallee-de-la-creuse/). I usually love Monet a lot, but this "Valley of the Creuse (sunset)" did not impress me. Perhaps because the color tone is too dull for my taste. There is a special tapestry copy of Picasso's Guernica, made by Spanish artist Jacqueline de La Baume (http://www.musee-unterlinden.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/160129_UNTER_FICHES_GB_15.pdf). Jacqueline is very talented at reproducing paintings on tapestry, but without copying the paintings. Picasso was impressed by her talent, and proposed to his admirer, the collector Nelson A. Rockefeller, that he could give permission to Jacqueline to make a tapestry based on his painting "Guernica". Together there are three pieces of this tapestry serious. First one in New Yorks, second one in Colmar, the last one is in Japan.
In this museum, the most famous piece is an Isenheim Altarpiece (http://www.musee-unterlinden.com/en/collections-du-musee-unterlinden/the-isenheim-altarpiece/), very large with the design of multilayers so that one can decide which pieces to show in which consequences. There are many other religious painting in the collections, although I am not interested to listen to all the audio guilds on the symbols and indications of this and that on the paintings.
There is one Picasso painting (Bust of a Seated Woman, http://www.musee-unterlinden.com/en/collections/buste-de-femme/), and one Monet painting (Valley of the Creuse (Sunset) http://www.musee-unterlinden.com/en/collections/la-vallee-de-la-creuse/). I usually love Monet a lot, but this "Valley of the Creuse (sunset)" did not impress me. Perhaps because the color tone is too dull for my taste. There is a special tapestry copy of Picasso's Guernica, made by Spanish artist Jacqueline de La Baume (http://www.musee-unterlinden.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/160129_UNTER_FICHES_GB_15.pdf). Jacqueline is very talented at reproducing paintings on tapestry, but without copying the paintings. Picasso was impressed by her talent, and proposed to his admirer, the collector Nelson A. Rockefeller, that he could give permission to Jacqueline to make a tapestry based on his painting "Guernica". Together there are three pieces of this tapestry serious. First one in New Yorks, second one in Colmar, the last one is in Japan.
Some of the modern arts on the topic of religious surprisedly interested me, especially after just watching their classical equivalent. For example, when I first saw a painting by Otto Dix- a German artist, I felt very uncomfortable of the school girl's scared face when the gosht is telling her something (http://www.musee-unterlinden.com/en/expositions/otto-dix-retable-issenheim/). And then my husband, who is always more observing than me, told me that this is an inspired painting by the "Isenheim Altarpiece". Then everything makes sense! Once the painting is put into the story of Marie being told that she is pregnant, I can totally understand what the painter wants to say. And I like this modern version much better than the classic version as I can feel more emotion from it. There are quite a few such modern versions of the classic religious stories. Another one I like is an abstract type "Portrait of Anne" by Nicolas de Staël (http://www.musee-unterlinden.com/en/collections/portrait-danne/).
Another surprise in this museum is that I saw several watercolor drawings by Hansi, a local drawer and designer. I really felt love with his style: watercolor, timber-house, cute people, warm and colorful tones. It is exactly the type of drawings I would like being able to draw. So we decide to run to Hansi Museum after Unterlinden Museum under heavy rain.
Hansi is the nick name of Colmar artist Jean-Jacques Waltz, people usually call him Uncle Hansi. He is very productive and various: not only water color paintings, but also designing for public signs, hand-painted tableware, advertisements, posters and clothes. He was hated by the Nazi in the second world war because of his anti-Nazi posters. The advertisement signs he designed for the Colmar shops still have four survivors, including one outside of the Hansi museum.
I love his drawing so much that even carry a thick book of his watercolor collection all the way back home. Now the book is lying on our sofa table reminding me to practice drawing everyday, although it does not seem to work....
No comments:
Post a Comment