Day trip to Saint-Brieuc.

 For a few weeks now I have been trying to plan going by Saint-Brieuc to see an art museum that has a free exhibition on the art of Henri Rivière going on right now.

I arrived at just about lunch time so I set out to find myself some lunch before going by the museum. From the financial shopping area I found myself making circle until I found myself in a more medieval section that had some restaurants. Although because of all the circling around I was a bit lost. Sadly not truly lost.

Three cheese baked potato with two salads and a glass of red wine.

At one point in my wandering I saw a sign that said to turn to go to a valley and as I was wandering and not wanting to take the same road to get back to where I came from I thought, 'why not?' The sidewalk turned to dirt path and I found myself deep in a valley with tall modern residence buildings peeking up from the trees on the top of the hill.
More paths up the valley to make it back to the city. I come across a place where some homeless people live under the road at the top. Decorations of discarded christmas ornaments.

The point of the exhibition is to address the influence of Japan upon the French art world in the late 1890s and early 1900s. Wood block prints of Bretagne in a Japanese style. I fell quite in love, but sadly they didn't allow any photos, even 'sans flash' because of something about they didn't have the rights to the pictures.
The works were beautiful. The ideas of Impressionism dealing with light and time and weather but done in printmaking and watercolor methods. There was one print of a woman in Bretagne running in a rain storm to get the animals under shelter that had such beautiful rain. Very light grey streaks blending into the setting but standing out in the sky. I would love to be able to figure out how to do rain like that in my art without the fear of it ruining the whole piece.
Sitting in a café that was crowded for lunch but now only a few people are left. Writing postcards in what looks like the interior of a ship.


I continue to wander. Finding new neighborhoods. Beautiful buildings. Those simple things that the French take for granted and I know I will dearly miss when I leave France.

Everything is so beautiful. Foggy and damp.

 Playing tourist with my camera in my hand and headphones in my ears. Music creating the soundtrack to my wandering. Songs with accordions.

I wander into another valley, or perhaps it is the same and I am just at another point. This time the path stays paved and I see an arrow sign for Emmaüs. A long walk to what feels like should be the countryside soon.
I come across a couple warehouses and I go inside. If I were to ever truly live in France I would adore being able to decorate where I live with beautiful furniture. The creation of a bohemian bordello.
I find a few skinny ties, a new decorative scarf, and a collection of old metal buttons. Trinkets.
 I continue the wandering. Through neighborhoods. Looking for the paths less taken. I come across a stairway weaving through the buildings on the side of the valley. Every landing is lightly graveled but a bed of grass has formed to hide that fact. It just keeps going on. Every time I make it up another level I see that it has another staircase up ahead.
I emerge at the top where some children play at a park with their parents watching on. I stop and look out over the valley that I just climbed out of.

Once again thinking that maybe I had become lost I continued to wander making a rash generalization that centre ville was in a random direction. As I cross a road I see a beautifully shaped tree and the end of the way. A decoration for a cemetery.
The shape perfectly complements the trees I saw earlier by Henri Rivière. Almost like a bonsai tree at some incredible size.

I ended this adventure at a wine bar I walk by and am lured in by the yellow lighting and oil lamps in the window. A lone woman sits outside smoking a cigarette and doing something on her phone.
Inside old men crowd around the bar and bullshit with glasses of wine in their hands. A dalmatian sits quietly in an alcove under the coffee machine. The ceiling is painted in trompe l'oeil and in the corner above the cigarettes for sale some kepis have been tacked to the ceiling somehow.
Old ladies in fur coats come in and all the old men and the bartenders give them little kisses on the cheeks.

I leave the bar to return to the trains station and figure out a way home. As I walk in to the train station the last train for Rennes until 5am pulls in and I quickly buy a ticket from the machine.
Last minute purchase defaults me to first class. The over stuffed chairs go from slouchingly relaxed to erect with the push of a button.
I pull out my tarot deck and play a couple of hands for myself. Both of the future cards have an element of escapism.