Henry Meilhac division 21 Montmartre

Albert Lejoint division 1 Montmartre

Robert Didsbury division 21 Montmartre

Jean Foucault division 7 Montmartre

"Dalida" division 18 Montmartre

Laurecisque division 1 Montmartre

Australian artist Thomas Roy Opie

Anyone have any information on the whereabouts of the burial site of Australian artist Thomas Roy Opie? He died in an automobile accident in Paris on 9 September 1968 and was reportedly buried in the western side of the city, in the vicinity of Bois de Boulogne.

Contact me or Col Fullagar. Thanks!

Australian artist Francis Brookes Spong

Anyone have any information on the whereabouts of the burial site of Australian artist Francis Brookes Spong? He died in Nice on 2 March 1929 and was presumably buried there.

Contact me or Col Fullagar. Thanks!

Pere Lachaise 81-97

Pere Lachaise divisions 81-97:

Pere Lachaise 41-80

Pere Lachaise divisions 41-80:

Victimes des révolutions (Mur des Fédérés)

In my last post I put up a photo of the "Mur des Fédérés" in division 76 of Pere Lachaise cemetery. That particular part of the cemetery is dotted with monuments to the tens of thousands of deported Jews, heroes of the French resistance during World War Two and to the many of France's most famous leaders of the Left.

One of the more interesting pieces commemorating those who died during revolutions is not inside the cemetery, but in a small, largely ignored park just outside the cemetery walls, running along Avenue Gambetta.

This incredible piece of sculpture by Paul Moreau-Vauthier, who, by the way, is buried in Division 14 of Pere Lachaise.

As you exit the Pere Lachaise metro, you'll see the cemetery walls bear to the left as you cross the street and walk up Avenue Gambetta for about 100m or so and you'll see the entrance to the little "jardin" on your right; just walk in and follow the cemetery wall for about another 50m or so and you'll see this incredible bit of sculpture.

Mur des Fédérés division 76

This is the "Mur des Fédérés," the memorial to the communards who were killed or executed during the final days of the commune of Paris in 1871. This is located in division 76 of Pere Lachaise cemetery, across from division 97, known for its many monuments and memorials to heroes of the resistance, the tens of thousands of deported French Jews and well-known leaders of the French leftist parties.

In fact, this is the area where the bodies of dozens of communards, many of whom were shot down in cold blood, were buried in mass graves. Many of France's leftist heroes are also buried in the vicinity: Karl Marx's daughter Laura and her husband Paul Lafargue (they committed suicide together in 1911), Maurice Thorez, the French Communist Party leader, Paul Eluard and many others.

Pere Lachaise 1-40

Pere Lachaise divisions 1 to 40:

Montparnasse petit

OK so you've seen the biggest portion of Montparnasse, but there's still plenty of cool things to see in the small, or "petit" sid eof the cemetery, that portion on the other side of Rue emile Richard:

Pere Lachaise in less than 5 minutes

Montparnasse Grande

Some of my favorite images from the larger portion of Montparnasse cemetery (Montparnasse grande):

The Cats of Montmartre

Of all the major cemeteries in Paris, for some odd reason Montmartre is home to a significantly large population of cats.

You can find these skittish felines in Pere Lachaise of course, and I have seen one or two in Montparnasse, but it is at Montmartre that they seem to congregate in large numbers. Perhaps Montmartre has always been lenient and understanding towards the marginalized elements of society. After all that's what gave the neighborhood it's cachet early on, the saloons, dives and dance halls that peppered the hillside among the abandoned windmills, and to some extent remains one of its most endearing features.

Montmartre cemetery

Located at the end of tiny Rue Rachel Montmartre cemetery is a place of refuge not only for the dead but also for the living: the folks seeking a moment or two of solitude in their lives. Go on, find out for yourself. . .

Belleville cemetery, 20th arrondissement

This is a very lightly retouched/manipulated photo of the Laurent family grave in Belleville cemetery, Paris. The central object is so compelling that I couldn't bring myself to modify anything other than the tonal values.

The cemetery is located near the spot where Claude Chappe set up his first practical semaphore telegraph signaling system in 1792. Chappe himself is buried in division 29 of Pere Lachaise.

Calvaire cemetery in Montmartre

I took this photo at Calvaire cemetery, near Sacre Coeur in Montmartre, Paris, on November 1, 2006. The cemetery is only open this one day out of the year, All-Saints' Day, and there was a line of people wending their way through the tiny burial ground trying to connect with the distant past, trying to fathom these Parisians long-dead for several centuries. In fact Calvaire is one of the two remaining church burial grounds left inside historic Paris, that is, inside the 20 arrondissements. (The other is Charonne in the 20th arr.) Shortly before the revolution in 1789 the king ordered all the church burial grounds closed (for health reasons) and the remains removed to what is now the famous catacombs in Montparnasse, in the southern section of the city.

For some reason, only Calvaire and Charonne were left undisturbed, more or less.

Anyway, following the closure of the old church burial grounds the city began creating cemeteries to the east (Pere Lachaise), south (Montparnasse) and north (Montmartre) to provide a more tidy and elegant repository for the remains of Paris' "departed."

Philippe Landru's new website

Over the years Philippe Landru and Marie have written and shared a series of informative articles on many of Paris's cemeteries and some of the more unique people interred in the city's burial grounds. Their work is exhaustively researched and meticulously details. Most of these Philippe put online at his website.

Marie has just informed me that Philippe has completely overhauled his website, which now covers not just the cemeteries of Paris and France but also some of the more notable burial spots in Europe, the UK and in the USA. Moreover, you can still access the numerous articles formerly available on his old site but the new site has a much more user-friendly navigation system and is spiffier look to boot.

It is in French only.

Just click here to check it out -- or cut and paste the following link:

http://www.landrucimetieres.fr/spip/

Montmartre

If you walk slowly enough and look hard enough, there hidden treasures everywhere in Montmartre cemetery. OK so I also tweaked this in Photoshop, that's true -- but all I did was copy the original image to a new layer, flip it horizontally, then using a layer mask and the gradient tool I made a mirror copy, merged the two layers together to form a new, more harmonious image.

City of the Dead - Pere Lachaise

If this street were a bit wider one might almost mistake it for the Appian Way, or what I like to think the Appian Way once looked like. Anyway, this is a fairly typical example of what sees by simply strolling this incredible open space. Here you can explore the strata of the last two hundred years of French history laid out for you in the form of a compact French village. Amazing.

Laurent in Belleville

Belleville cemetery sits on the spot where Claude Chappe set up his first semaphore station. One of the most evocative pieces of funerary statuary in Paris is without a doubt the remains of a bust that sits over the graves of the Laurent family.

A corner in Calvaire

One of the last two ancient church burying grounds left inside historic Paris, Calvaire cemetery is located on the heights of Montmartre, just a stone's throw from Sacre Coeur.

The cemetery is open only one day a year, however, 1 November, All-Soul's Day.

The other old church burying ground? Charonne in the 20th arr. near Pere Lachaise.

This image is taken from a tiny corner in this very tiny cemetery.

Better later than never - Fresnel is found!

That's right Marie B. has found Fresnel's grave in Division 14 of Pere Lachaise. I recall looking for him probably a dozen times -- and eventually involving Marie and, I think even Philippe in the search for his grave.

Who is Fresnel and why should we care? For an answer to the first half of that question, check out what Wikipedia says.

As for the second half, well I suppose it's because of his work in developing the lens used in virtually every lighthouse in the world!

Blaise Pascal, Jean Racine and the patron Saint of Paris

OK so these two are interred in St. Etienne du Mont, and not in an outdoor burial ground, the main focus of this blog and my Paris cemeteries website. But hey, they are, after all, two of the great luminaries of French cultural history. Anyway, located just across from the backside of the Pantheon this church is probably often overlooked by many tourists. They walk throuugh the hallowed halls of the Pantheon to pay their respects to the great figures of French history and probably never think to slide around the corner and stop in at the seemingly unremarkable church sitting in the back corner.

But that would be a mistake. Once inside you'll discover this is an amazing piece of artwork in wood, stone and glass.



In fact this very space was quite probably the location of one of the very first Christian churches built in Paris. Originally built in honor of Saints Peter and Paul, by Clovis, king of the Franks, he had the church rededicated to Sainte Genevieve (422-512) who was the patron saint of Paris (she reportedly turned Attila away from the gates of Paris). The first chapel was built around her crypt in the sixth century and subsequently extended and enlarged over the centuries. (That's her sarcophagus below.)

Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) was a mathematician (he wrote a treatise on projective geometry at the age of sixteen), physicist and religious philosopher. He also became one of the great French prose writers and his wit and insight reflected in works such as the Pensees, is still a touchstone in Western literature. (His death mask is below.)

Jean Racine (1639-1699) is one of the great French dramatists and poets, certainly one of the great tragedians of the 17th century, and is read widely today for his elegant and simple style of writing.

A wonderful little detour. and aftewards you can take the five-minute stroll over to the Place Contrescarpe for a coffee or aperitif. How about that?

Chapelle Expiatoire

The Chapelle Expiatoire, or chapel of atonement, which contains the remains of some 3,000 people guillotined during the French Revolution, is closed until the middle of November while repair work is being done on the garden surrounding the vaults.

Montmartre surprise

I was in Montmartre cemetery tracking down several people -- residents of course -- when I came across quite a pleasant surprise.

One of my objectives was to note the information on the two large, perhaps the largest, monuments in the cemetery. Both are side-by-side in division 29 and front onto avenue de Montmorency. The tall obelisk belongs to the Duc du Montmorency-Luxembourg; the other, a much larger and grandiose structure simply notes "Kollitsch" and then below it "Sepulture Marc Lejeune." The grill on the door to the Lejeune mausoleum was a bit high for me to look through so I used my camera to take several photos of the interior. The results were astounding, as you can see below.



It is quite rare these days to find an older masoleum interior in such good shape -- and the colors are still vibrant and quite striking.

General Andranik and Armenian independence

You may recall news stories within the past year regarding France's hard-line position on the issue of whether Turkey committed genocide in 1916 when various elements of the Turkish government systematically and wantonly exterminated more than a half million Armenians. France says that Turkey committed government-sponsored genocide and wants Turkey to admit it. Turkey says, no it won't admit to something that isn't true. It doesn't deny the deaths of a large porportion of the Armenians living in Turkey during the war but says it was not "genocide."

Anyway, France has a long history of affection for the Armenian people, many of whom fought alongside French troops during the First World War (when Turkey fought on the side of, ahem, the Germans).

Besides the grand monument to those soldiers who fell fighting for France (at the edge of division 88 along the avenue des etrangers mort pur la France) in Pere Lachaise, you can also find one of the most illustrious heroes of Armenian independence, General Andranik (or Antranik, 1865-1927). Andranik led the Aremnian volunteers fighting alongside the Russians against the Central Powers, which included Germany, Austria and their ally Turkey. After the war he went into exile settling in Fresno, California, where he lived until his death. His remains were sent to Paris for burial, the communist authorities refusing to allow his body to be brought back home to Bulgaria where he had been born. In 2000 his remains were at last returned to Armenia.

Although he is no longer buried in division 94 (just around the corner from Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas, of all people), General Andranik sitting his jumping horse, waving his sword and leading his men forward, still cuts a most striking figure. (see photo above; photos below are details from the statue.)

A fan visits Marcel Marceau's grave

I met David on the path seperating divisions 9 and 10; he was trying to inquire from some workmen repairing a headstone, where he might find Marcel Marceau's grave. They seemed eager to help but were at a loss of trying to (a) understand what he wanted and (b) help him find his way. I was walking by and overheard his pleas for assistance so I quietly butted in and asked if I could help.

He replied in a very British accent that he wanted to find Marceau's grave as he has a few things he wanted to place on it -- he had heard that there weren't many in attendance at the funeral and was concerned that the great man's memory was already being lost. So here he was to make a small contribution to set things right.

I handed him a cemetery guidemap -- I always keep a half dozen or so handy for just such occasions and end up giving most of the out every time I go to the cemetery.

He said "no thanks," he had no idea where he was and would I be so kind as to show him the grave. He was most insistent on his lack of map-reading skills and appeared really so eager to find the grave that I said I'd be happy to show him the way. It was only a few-minute walk over to division 21 and so off we went.

Moments later and we were standing over the mound of flowers that had been left in wake of the funeral last week. (Get it, "wake"?) David then pulled out a sheaf of plastic-covered small posters, each imprinted with an image of Marcel and a little bit about his life. He then placed them around the flowers and I took his photo. He seemed so pleased to be able to do this for someone he felt had made an impact on his life.

I then pointed him toward the way back to the main gate. He thanked me and off he went smiling.

Wish you had been there,

Steve

Fall at Pere Lachaise

This was shot looking over division 70 in Pere Lachaise cemetery, on Tuesday, 2 October. Fall is most certainly here in Paris notwithstanding the sticky, humid and otherwise summer-like weather.

Marcel Marceau is in division 21

For those of you looking for Marcel Marceau's grave it is smack in the middle of division 21, Pere Lachaise cemetery, just across Avenue de Saint-Morys, from the chapel and Adolphe Thiers' huge mausoleum. There is no marker yet but plenty of flowers to guide you.

Marcel Marceau

I recently paid a visit to the final resting place of the famous mime Marcel Marceau, who died in Paris at the age of 84.

A little something for your soul, from Paris

A little something hovering below the Arc de Triomphe and floating above the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Paris. Turn your speakers on and the volume up si vous plait!

Back in Pere Lachaise

Well I'm back in Paris untill the end of October and of course one of the first things I had to do was to go to Pere Lachaise cemetery, particularly I now that live just about 10 minutes away!

Anyway I wanted to pay my respects to several of my favorites: Jacob Robles (7th div.), the aeronaut Madelaine Sophie Blanchard (1778-1819, 13th div.):


To Jane Avril (1868-1943, 19th div.), one of Toulouse-Latrec's most well-known models and one of the great caberet dancers of Paris:


And to Fernand Arbelot (1880-1942, div. 11), whose one desire in death was to forever gaze on the face of his wife:

A quick and short look at Pere Lachaise

Here's another short video made from footage I shot at Pere Lachaise in 2006-2007. The people who come and visit the cemeteries of Paris are almost, I say almost, as fascinating as the people they come to visit. This is just the tip of the iceberg.

Paris is to die for, part 2

Here's another short video of random images I shot in Pere Lachaise cemetery in 2006-2007.

Paris is to die for

Here is a short movie of some random images I shot in Montmartre, Montparnasse and Passy cemeteries in 2006-2007.

Dalida in Montmartre

You can find Egyptian-born entertainer "Dalida" (Yolande Gigliotti) in division 18 of Montmartre cemetery. She committerd suicide in 1987.

Jouet in Montmartre

You can find this in the middle of division 24 of Montmartre cemetery:

Three more reasons to visit the cemeteries of Paris

OK so you've been to the Musee d'Orsay and seen ther fantastic art of Edouard Manet. Now pay a visit to his grave at Passy cemetery in the shadow of the Eiffel tower:

Hang around cemetery of Montrouge, a part of Paris that Robert Doisneau spent much of his life photographing, and maybe you'll see someone like this:


And for a view of the Paris that many Parisians alone get to see check this spot out in Gentilly cemetery:


Ciao,

Steve