L’Arc de Triomphe, Wrapped

Today marks the last day of Christo and Jeanne-Claude‘s latest installation in Paris: L’Arc de Triomphe, Wrapped. For those who didn’t have a chance to see this work in person, I’m sharing images to bring it more to life.

Personally, I found this work both poetic and symbolic. Walking around and through this wrapped Arc, the fabric billows in the wind, creating soft undulating waves. This silver fabric changed color throughout the day.

In an interview with Christo in 2018, he spoke about how as a young artist he lived in a small studio off of the Champs-Élysées, with the Arc as his view. How fitting to end his journey with this installation.

Read more about what Christo shared with me in this article I wrote for Hemispheres Magazine. At the time, I looked forward to our meeting in person. Unfortunately, that never happened due to his passing in 2020.

Walking beneath the Arc de Triomphe allows you to feel its immensity and the challenge of wrapping such a monumental building. A skilled team of mountain climbers worked non-stop over almost 12 weeks.

While this installation certainly proved controversial on the question of What is art? keep in mind that it was completely funded by Christo and Jeanne-Claude through the selling of their artwork. This was their way.

I will miss the presence of Christo and Jeanne-Claude in Paris, but I know their souls will remain in the city, the only place where they chose to present two works. From The Pont Neuf Wrapped to L’Arc de Triomphe, Wrapped.

Christo and Jean-Claude in Paris

With Paris safely back to life following the summer holidays, the city’s art scene is buzzing, from large museums to intimate galleries. One show not to miss that unfortunately many will miss due to travel restrictions is Christo and Jean-Claude Paris! going on at Centre Pompidou until October 19th. A great fan of Christo’s work ever since I walked through his exhibition The Gates in New York’s Central Park in 2005, I had the good fortune to speak with him in an interview last November for this article in Hemispheres. Our meeting in Paris never materialized, unfortunately, as the 85-year-old artist sadly passed away in late May. His and Jean-Claude’s legacy lives on, as you’ll see in these select works from the Pompidou exhibition. To learn more about the life of Christo and Jean-Claude in Paris, here’s an insightful and touching film by the Maysles brothers.


  • Packing Surface, 1958
  • Wrapped Oil Barrels, 1959

As you can tell from these works, Christo wrapped various objects with fabric stiffened with lacquer and tied with string, including the Wrapped Toy Horse, 1963.

  • Package, 1960
  • Wrapped Portrait of Jean-Claude 1963

Earning a living as a portrait painter for high society, Christo first met Jean-Claude while painting her mother.

Christo’s best-known work during his Parisian years was his Packages, created between 1958 and 1964. He played with material and color and never disclosed what was inside the packages.

Christo’s “Store Fronts” series in which he covered the inside of recycled display cases and rebuilt storefronts with paper, confirmed his interest in exploring an architectural dimension in his work. This is what led to his urban projects to follow.

In 1975, Christo and Jean-Claude came up with the idea of wrapping the Pont-Neuf bridge with golden sandstone polyamide fabric. Their goal was to create a temporary work in direct contact with reality. They wanted to create interaction among those who walked along the bridge. It wasn’t until 1985 that their dream was realized.

As Christo shared with me during our conversation, Paris was the only city in which he had planned on creating two major installations. His second being the wrapping of the Arc de Triomphe in a silver-blue fabric, which will now take place in Fall 2021. I have no doubt that Christo and Jean-Claude will be there in spirit.

Art and History Lessons From Home

Anyone else missing going to museums and learning about art while getting a lesson in history? Well, now you can, and from the comfort of your own home. Join these leading tour companies as they adapt to this unprecedented time during which travel is restricted, and will be for a time to come. Companies including Context Travel, Take Walks, and THATMuse are offering alternative methods of learning, from home! Ready to stimulate your mind by joining classes in history and art led by leading experts in their fields?

Join a historian at Context Travel for Context Conversations, inviting guests into the real life of the people, history, and culture of the world’s greatest cities. Online live learning seminars include ‘The Colosseum and Roman Forum in the Time of the Emperors’ and ‘Tate Modern: What is Art?’ Each live lecture via zoom is 40€.

In Take Walks Tours from Home, join Archaeologist & TV Host Darius Arya as he presents ‘Ancient Rome for All Ages’. This three-part series highlights the foundational myths to the rise of the emperors to Rome’s decline. Other Tours from Home include ‘NYC Met Museum Tour With a Twist’, ‘Journey into St. Mark’s Basilica, the Venetian Gem’ and ‘Descend into the Darkness of Paris’ Catacombs’. Each hour-long tour costs 9€-10€.

Meanwhile, a leader in museum treasure hunts in Paris and London, THATMuse is helping families Play With Art at Home by offering free portrait party kits to help kids learn about art. This skillfully crafted educational kit includes Michelangelo connect-the-dots, French Neo-Classical perspective exercises from David’s Oath of Horatii, and a deciphering a da Vinci exercise. Join the THATMuse blog to keep up to date with all the artful fun!

Private Tour of an Empty Louvre

Sometimes life in Paris feels like living a dream. This was the case when I was invited on a private art tour of a closed Louvre Museum. The occasion was to discover the artful inspiration behind eight new limited edition Buly 1803 fragrances, each one created by a leading French perfumer. Ready for this exceptional tour?

Two weeks earlier I met with Victoire de Taillac who in 2014 along with her husband Ramdane Touhami, opened their all-natural fragrance emporium Buly 1803 first in Saint Germain and soon after in the Haut Marais. Read more about the brand in my Luxos feature. Now back to the Louvre tour, starting with “the most feminine woman on earth” Venus de Milo. What does she smell like, you wonder? According to the perfumer inspired by this femme fatale, an exhilarating blend of mandarine, jasmine and amber.

Walking around an empty Louvre was surreal! Joined only by a handful of fellow journalists from around the world, we were led through the stillness of centuries-old chambers by Victoire and our expert guide.

The next stop was to a personal favorite, La Victoire de Samothrace, the Greek goddess symbolizing victory.

The Winged Victory of Samothrace, a Hellenistic marble sculpture of Nike, dates back to the 2nd century BC. I was completely taken by the majesty of this Greek goddess as we shared a moment in quietude. And her scent? A mix of tuberose, magnolia and jasmine with a hint of myrrh.

Our sensory tour continued to La Grande Odalisque, an oil painting by Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres from 1814. As interpreted by the perfumer, her fragrance exudes incense and pink pepper along with musky notes.

Discretely hidden in the corner of the Louvre was painting Conversation in a Park by Thomas Gainsborough. As Victoire explained, this scent exudes notes of peppermint and bergamot along with Ottoman roses.

All of my senses were engaged as the tour continued from one empty room to another, the only other personalities present being those captured in frames upon the walls.

Our last stop was to Nymph with the Scorpion by Lorenzo Bartolini. This sculpture inspired a scent composed of heliotrope and jasmine with a touch of amber and musk.

While a tour of the closed Louvre isn’t available to the public, you can take a treasure hunt with THATMuse to discover many remarkable artworks, and have great fun while you’re at it. Trust me, I’ve been on a few!

Before leaving the Louvre we stopped at the Buly 1803 pop-up shop. Here I was able to sample all eight art inspired scents, along with their first collection of alcohol-free fragrances.

Obsessed with fragrances, my chosen scent was La Victoire de Samothrace. It brought me right back to Greece!

These Louvre inspired perfumes are available now until January 6th. In case you can’t make it to the Louvre Museum for your own sensory tour, these eight perfumes are also on sale at Buly 1803 and online.

Next time you encounter an artwork wherever you are in the world, imagine what it would smell like.

Ceramic Artist in Bloom

On the occasion of International Women’s Day, who better to feature than my own mother, one of the strongest and most positive forces in my life. Not only does this woman possess the kindest of hearts, she’s also uniquely talented. From her days of running a Polish Folk art gallery in the Hamptons to creating her own line of t-shirts (whose prints inspired my first hand-painted bags) to becoming an interior decorator, this woman is an inspiration! These days, since spending winters in Florida she has discovered a new passion, ceramic art.

After being invited to join a ceramics class in her South Florida community center in 2006, her ceramic garden quickly blossomed. I’m immensely proud of her innate talent as a ceramic artist, can you tell? She even created 35 ceramic roses for my wedding in the Italian Riviera. What’s better than flowers that never lose their bloom!

Themes aren’t limited to flowers. Basia presented her ‘Best in Show’ dog series at several exhibitions in Westhampton Beach. Aren’t they cute? She also had a solo exhibition of her work in Sanok, her hometown in Poland. I’ll soon be writing about her for a ceramics magazine in Australia, stay tuned!

My mom is endlessly inspired by her trips to Paris, where she spends hours with the Impressionists at the Louvre and the Musée d’Orsay. Last year’s trip to the gardens of Giverny was a dream! This spring I’m taking her to the South of France where she’ll undoubtedly fall in love with the Provençal landscapes.

View more of Basia Dietz-Zieba’s ceramic art on her website and follow her on Facebook and Instagram.

Lights. Camera. Klimt!

Ready to be captivated? If you’re in Paris before November 11th, discover Atelier des Lumières, Paris’s first digital art center featuring 120 video-projectors. The space, a former 19th-century iron foundry in the 11th arrondissement, opened this past April with the show Klimt and Vienna. “We cross over 100 years of Viennese painting through the pictorial work of Gustav Klimt (1862-1918), Egon Schiele (1890-1918) and Friedensreich Hundertwasser (1928-2000) thanks to a breathtaking visual and sound show.”

Here I take you on a little journey to discover these artists like you’ve never seen them before. Personally, I’ve only ever seen something as magical at Carrières de Lumières in Baux-de-Provence while visiting Baumanière.

This is a difficult experience to capture well on film or video, and one that merits a visit. You will thank me!

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