Latest news with #Cézanne
Malay Mail
13-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Malay Mail
Inside Desa Parkcity, Cézanne charms with their modern European dishes seen through an Asian lens
KUALA LUMPUR, June 13 — Three years ago, Playte closed to the dismay of its regulars who enjoyed the contemporary European offerings with an Asian tilt served at the Damansara Heights eatery. Many mourned the loss of their superb, aged duck, labelled by some as 'best duck in the Klang Valley', lovingly prepared by Playte's chef owner Brendon Chen, a tribute to his childhood favourite, the Peking Duck. Well, these same fans will be ecstatic to find out that Chen is back with an intimate chef's counter at Cézanne which is tucked inside Plaza Arkadia. Located inside Qing Gallery, the restaurant's sombre brown and grey palette comes as a surprise as you have to walk through the gallery's wave of colours and bold expressions to reach it. The restaurant's quiet ambience describes Chen's approach which is born out of his Le Cordon Bleu days with stints in Taipei's Mume, Sitka and Nadodi; see him quietly painting a plethora of small modern European plates that subtly touch on Chinese and local elements. There's one tasting menu, ranging in size between five-courses (RM348++ a person) or seven-courses (RM548++ a person), with an option to add wine pairing or a juice and tea pairing. Your meal opens with two refined one-bite snacks such as a seaweed tartlet and braised abalone in pai tee shell. The crisp ebony black tartlet with burnt chilli pesto and tiny chopped century egg, may sound like a wacky flavour combination but its restrained heat, cooled off with the tofu cream and a whisper of savouriness from the jellied preserved egg whites rather than the pungency from the yolk. The second one-bite leans more towards a mix of textures and subtle flavours, as a pai tee shell cradles chopped braised abalone, shiso, avocado, a subtle ginger mayonnaise crowned with bits of fried kale reminiscent of seaweed. There is also the sourdough bread paired with a divine butter with an intriguing saltiness, using fermented black beans. Refreshing and light striped jack is combined with tomato water and sprinkled with ginger flower powder. — Picture by Lee Khang Yi The first course is the striped jack presented with a clear tomato water and fig vinegar dotted with fig leaf oil, showered with ginger flower snow, giving it an ethereal smoky mist, leaving a clean yet complex flavour on the tongue as the floral fragrance tickles your nostrils. A perfectly seared Hokkaido scallop sits on curry, where spicy notes are tempered with the sweetness from pear and pumpkin, layered with smoked eggplant puree, fried preserved radish, and pucuk manis. The bright orange curry with just a hint of spiciness dotted with curry leaf oil, balances out the plump scallop finished with kulim brown butter, making one wish you could mop up the curry with a piece of bread. Pan seared Hokkaido scallop is placed on a pear and pumpkin curry, smoked eggplant and 'pucuk manis'. — Picture by Lee Khang Yi The push-and-pull of flavours from refreshing to slightly spicy, switches into a delicate mode with the soy milk and duck egg custard, dotted with earthy maitake mushrooms, almonds and salt baked jicama for crunch. A beautiful golden hued caramelised onion broth pulses up the silky chawan mushi with a delicate sweet, umami flavour from the slow cooked onions. Soy milk custard is a dreamy dish with maitake mushrooms and golden caramelised onion broth. — Picture by Lee Khang Yi As you're introduced to the sea bream dish, you might be thinking that the pickled green chillies are an outlier. Turns out it's Chen's interpretation of a sharks fin soup where the slightly thick broth is replaced with a refreshing sake and fish broth with flower crab and edamame beans, paired with a flaky sea bream and crunchy rice puffs. Sea bream is served with a sake and fish broth, flower crab, edamame beans, rice puffs and the unusual pickled green chillies. — Picture by Lee Khang Yi Then it's time for the main event, a choice of their aged duck or Japanese A4 wagyu beef with an oxtail and coffee sauce. With the selection of the aged duck, the first part is an interpretation of Peking duck pancakes, where a buckwheat pancake uses a duck leg confit shaped into a roll, to be eaten like a Mexican taco. Sweet soybean sauce is swapped for a cherry and black garlic puree, a nod towards the classic French canard aux cerises dish where duck is paired with a tart cherry jam. On the side, one gets an unexpected flavour in the form of a yuba tartlet filled with yellow wine-marinated foie gras parfait and pineapple. Duck leg confit with buckwheat pancake and cherry and black garlic puree (left) takes inspiration from Peking duck pancakes and yuba tartlet with yellow wine 'foie gras' parfait and pineapple (right) is a burst of sweetness and creaminess. — Picture by Lee Khang Yi It's a melange of sweetness from the wine that floods the mouth with one bite, followed by creaminess from the foie gras and the refreshing pineapple. The 14-days aged duck was as good or maybe even better than I remembered, with a thin, crispy skin together with the moist, juicy meat, on a tamarind and mandarin peel jus. The chef's famous 14-days aged duck with crispy skin and juicy meat is excellent. — Picture by Lee Khang Yi As we wind down for desserts, an ulam granita with a cocktail of pickled guava, kedondong juice and dill oil, cleanses the palate with its puckering refreshness, Dessert takes inspiration from the classic morning coffee shop ritual with their modern rendition of roti bakar. There's also banana madeleine and a choux puff with pandan mochi and gula Melaka cream for petit fours. The cloud-like roti bakar reinterpretation starts with a base of French toast, where the egg is in the custard soaked bread, pan fried to replicate the toasty flavours. 'Roti bakar' is reinvented into a dessert of French toast, Earl Grey ice cream, 'pandan kaya' mousse and brown butter powder. — Picture by Lee Khang Yi Your cup of tea is reimagined into a smooth Earl Grey ice cream with pandan kaya mousse, topping the bread and given a final flourish of brown butter powder. It's definitely a show stopper to end a meal that tugged on nostalgic flavours with Chinese and Asian links, cleverly conceptualised with European techniques, and cooked right in front of you at the chef's table. Cézanne Restaurant, Block C-GF-01, Plaza Arkadia, 3, Jalan Intisari, Desa Parkcity, Kuala Lumpur. Open: 6pm to 11pm (Tuesday to Saturday) Closed on Sunday and Monday Tel: 012-5773229. Website: @cezannekl Instagram: @ * This is an independent review where the writer paid for the meal. * Follow us on Instagram @eatdrinkmm for more food gems.
Belfast Telegraph
07-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Belfast Telegraph
Travel Review: Once Provence casts its spell, you might never want to leave
Experience the beautiful views and places that have inspired creativity from Picasso, Cézanne and Van Gogh, and boasts lavender fields like nowhere else on earth Deep in the heart of Provence, near the Roman town of Aix, lies one of the art world's most remarkable and unexpected destinations. Château La Coste, a 200-hectare estate of vines and olive groves, hosts an extraordinary collection of contemporary works by global luminaries: Damien Hirst, Tracey Emin, Ai Weiwei, Dublin-born Sean Scully, Louise Bourgeois and even Bob Dylan, Michael Stipe of R.E.M. and Yoko Ono. You might assume this visionary project sprang from the mind of an art lover from Paris, Rome or New York. In fact, its roots are closer to home. Mara McKillen, the heart and soul of Château La Coste, was born in Belfast. Together with her brother, hotelier and developer Paddy McKillen and their team, she has spent two decades transforming this traditional farmland into a celebrated haven for art, wine and architecture.
Perth Now
29-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Perth Now
Cézanne the modernist influencer in NGA blockbuster
Modernist artworks from Germany's Museum Berggruen are on show in Australia for the first time, including big names such as Cézanne, Matisse and Picasso. Cézanne to Giacometti: Highlights from Museum Berggruen is the National Gallery of Australia in Canberra's winter blockbuster show. The museum collection has been touring internationally while its Berlin building is closed for renovation, and the exhibition has already visited half a dozen cities and been viewed by about a million people. But the Australian version is different - it's no out-of-the-box show, instead integrating art from giants of European modernism with works by Australian artists. The result is a story of the dynamic exchange of 20th century artistic ideas over decades and across the world, and the development of modernism in Australia. "I think it is the most accomplished and the most meaningful venue so far in the entire tour in terms of research into art history, because of this dialogue," said the head of Museum Berggruen, Dr Gabriel Montua. More than 80 works from the museum sit alongside 75 works from the national collection, by artists such as Russell Drysdale, Grace Cossington Smith and Dorrit Black. The exhibition opens with Cézanne's experiments in form and perspective, on show with works by Australian artists like Drysdale and Ian Fairweather, who were influenced by his innovations. Rarely seen works by Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque show the breakthroughs of Cubism, hung with Australian artists such as Dorrit Black, Grace Crowley and Roy de Maistre. There are sections devoted to Paul Klee, Dora Maar and Henri Matisse, while a sculpture by Giacometti measuring more than two metres high represents the first time a such large scale Giacometti has been displayed down under. All of the artists in the exhibition ultimately come back to Cézanne's innovations, according to NGA curator David Greenhalgh. "He is the figurehead who inspired so much of what came after," said Greenhalgh. "There's a real sense of a lot of these artists looking at one another and deriving inspiration from one another." The Berggruen collection is the life's work of art dealer Heinz Berggruen, who fled Germany before World War II and sold his collection to the German state in 2000, ensuring it would be available to the public. Many of the artists he collected were deliberately removed from German art collections, because they were deemed degenerate during the Nazi reign. The exhibition opens Saturday and runs till September 21. AAP travelled to Canberra with the assistance of the National Gallery of Australia.
Irish Times
25-05-2025
- General
- Irish Times
Downsizing in Ranelagh: a sun-kissed slice of Provence in Dublin 6
A Ranelagh homeowner traded down to a house around the corner from her original three-storey abode, the smaller property a villa-style residence overlooking a large green space. It had, she explains, lovely period features including good ceiling heights, cornicing and ceiling roses, dado rails, architraves and timber floorboards. When she bought it, the reception rooms were upstairs, at entrance level, while the kitchen was downstairs, and ran the depth of the house. This lower-floor room opened out to the garden to the rear which, although south-facing, was relatively small. The homeowner brought in Mícheál de Siún of De Siún Architects and, in doing so, achieved a more balanced house, with all the living space on the same floor, now washed in light. She and her late husband had spent a lot of time in the south of France , and it was a painting, Paul Cézanne's Gardanne 1866, a view of the hill town of that name near Aix-en-Provence, that was the inspiration for the ambient renovation. Gardanne, 1866 by Paul Cézanne 'Light was also central to the brief,' says de Siún. By demolishing an outhouse and outside toilet, the architect explains, he gained space to the side of the house. This gave him the room to push the property out to its perimeter wall at entrance level. READ MORE The extension has added just 19sq m (204sq ft) of space, but it is the reorientation of the rooms to the left of the entrance hall, and the addition of glazing on three sides, that is transformative. Mícheál de Siún of De Siún Architects, who were behind the reinterpretation and renovation of the Ranelagh property. Photograph: Alan Betson Now, instead of a small and relatively enclosed back garden, the livingrooms overlook the aforementioned green, affording a front-row view of its trees, their colours changing with the seasons. The kitchen-diningroom now gives the impression of hanging above the boundary wall – the line of which follows the river Swan, which appears on maps dating from mid-1700s and now runs underground, de Siún says – and of being among those trees. 'It feels like you're floating,' de Siún says. The house plants too are thriving on all the sunlight. Exterior. Photograph: Alan Betson Extended area. Photograph: Alan Betson Kitchen area. Photograph: Alan Betson View to rear Renovation designed by De Siún Architects The glass is interspersed with timber upright fins to shield the space from the outside. These are finished in Owatrol oil in Weathered Grey. By inserting a long roof light into the centre of the room, areas that would have been discernibly darker have been illuminated. A beech dining set adds further warmth and is adjacent to a long built-in window seat. The olive-green colour used on the Teroco windows is RAL 6003, to which the steel, by H&M Ironwork, inside and out, was matched. The nature of this home's reinterpretation means the interior is washed in light from sun up to sundown. In the mornings the exterior fins are dappled with shadowplay from the leaves on the trees, backlit by the sun. Livingroom. Photograph: Alan Betson Window on to green space. Photograph: Alan Betson Hallway. Photograph: Alan Betson The elements of the bespoke kitchen, designed and made by Dean Cooper, have been 'scribed to fit', as de Siún puts it, meaning that the units have been constructed to specifically suit the period property's proportions and non-straight walls. It's subtly done and explains why the Nettle Soup-coloured cabinetry, a Colourtrend shade, looks so at home in the space. The Cézanne painting, which now hangs in the Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art in New York, helped the owner select the serene shades that feature on the walls and woodwork. The kitchen island was also made to measure; it's 1m wide and 2.5m long, with ribbed ends to add texture and to echo the character of the architraves, de Siún explains. All this attention to detail knits together the kitchen area, in the old front room, and newly added dining-cum-reading nook. Behind a half wall is additional space housing a guest WC, cloakroom and side entrance via granite steps down to the front garden, all hidden from view from the cooking area. The wallpaper in the lavatory has a painterly quality too; this time it could be a Dutch master. WC. Photograph: Alan Betson Bathroom. Photograph: Alan Betson Exterior. Photograph: Alan Betson Across the hall the interconnecting rooms remain much as they were. Their large sash windows continue to wash the space in light from front to back. The painted cast-iron fireplaces endure, and the beautifully engineered set of original fold-back doors still sit flush with the walls. The blackened floorboards, which had possibly been covered in a bitumen paint, have been sanded back and are now stained a soft matt honey tone, a colour from Osmo oil tints. This helps bring this entire upper floor together. Here, there is a full-size burl walnut grand piano that belonged to the family of the homeowner's late husband and had to be winched up to the second floor of her former home, she recalls. 'They had to take out a window,' she says, delightedly reporting that there was no such drama when bringing it into this home. Her Aunt Molly's dining table is also in this room, and it is lovely to see such pieces with stories on show. Downstairs, the principal bedroom has an en suite bathroom that features microcememt tinted a bleached terracotta. The colour, Fleetwood Shell Coral, is a replica of the sun-warmed rooftops of the Cézanne. Microcement, de Siún explains, 'is worked on by hand and has a finish that feels like polished concrete. The colour is handmade per batch. The owner didn't want to use tiles and there are no seams or joins.' Now when the family gathers, they can wander between the reception rooms and the kitchen-diningroom. The grandchildren, who often excuse themselves after dinner, can jump over the wall with a ball and have a kickabout, surveyed, but only from a distance, by their parents. The work, which was executed by MSVI builders, was a winner in the home extension refurbishment, medium size, at this year's Building and Architect of the Year awards. 'It's very easy to manage,' says the owner. 'I have just 18 steps down to bed, rather than the 50 up to bed in the previous house.'
Irish Examiner
24-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Irish Examiner
Experiencing the light-filled landscapes of Provence that inspired Cézanne's works
It is quite astonishing to realise that a painting few people wanted to buy a little over a century ago is now worth a quarter of a billion dollars. Paul Cézanne's The Card Players became the most expensive piece of art in the world in 2011 when it was bought by the Qatar royal family for $250m. It has since been overtaken by two other masterpieces, Willem de Kooning's Interchange for $300m in 2015 and Leonardo da Vinci's Salvator Mundi for $450m in 2017. But that hardly diminishes the magnitude of what The Card Players achieved — a painting from 1890-'92 of two of Cézanne's humble estate workers playing at a table in a dark room. Cézanne, along with other contemporary impressionist and post-impressionist artists like Vincent Van Gogh, was not appreciated in his time. But unlike the Dutch genius, Cézanne did not die in poverty. His father, Louis-Auguste, was a successful banker who gave his son an allowance enabling him to follow his dream of becoming a painter. And he and his two sisters, Marie and Rose, inherited the family estate, Jas de Bouffan. But despite producing countless paintings of the surrounding countryside, he was never accepted in his hometown of Aix-en-Provence which refused to exhibit his work. Now a further ignominy has been discovered. Jas de Bouffan, where he lived for 40 years, is currently being restored for its first ever public opening which will coincide with a landmark exhibition of his work, Cézanne at Jas de Bouffan, from June 28 to October 12. Cézanne Paul (1839-1906). États-Unis, Chicago (IL), The Art Institute of Chicago. 1942.457. During the renovation, workers discovered an unknown painting on an inside wall of the house — under a layer of white paint. Someone who owned the beautiful period home after Cézanne's time was so unimpressed by the fresco they simply painted over it. Initial signs suggest it is a scene of boats on a river and it is now being restored. The grand salon of the house was once covered in Cézanne's frescos. But when the artist started to become recognised years after his death the paintings on plaster were cut from the walls, put in frames and sold around the world. We are on a tour of the estate and work is still busily going on for the grand opening. Piles of calade, large pebbles native to Provence, are ready for cobblestone-style groundwork, ditches are dug for power cables, and a large reservoir, which looks like a swimming pool, is to be cleaned. A beautiful alley of trees is much like it appeared in Cézanne's The Allée of Chestmut Trees at the Jas de Bouffan. The estate, once in the countryside, is now surrounded by urban development. Mont Sainte-Victoire, Cézanne's beloved mountain which he painted no fewer than 77 times, and which was once clearly visible from the property, is now hidden from view. We are lucky to be the first recent visitors to the estate — it used to be by appointment only — which was taken over by the local authority in 1994. From this summer, admirers of the artist will be able to walk in his footsteps and stand where he painted many of his works in an upstairs studio his father built for him, lit by a large skylight. It was here, surrounded by 15 hectares of vineyards and orchards, that he produced his still lifes, portraits, and self-portraits, many of which will feature in the exhibition in the local Musée Granet. The Card Players was one of a series of five painted here in the 1890s. During the renovation of Jas de Bouffan, workers discovered an unknown painting on an inside wall of the house — under a layer of white paint. Someone who owned the beautiful period home after Cézanne's time was so unimpressed by the fresco they simply painted over it. Initial signs suggest it is a scene of boats on a river and it is now being restored. The ground floor and an upstairs room are being prepared for the opening but others will not be finished until next year. Visitors will also be able to visit the studio he built, the 'Atelier des Lauves', after being forced to sell Jas de Bouffan in 1899 to give his sisters their share of their father's inheritance. The artist produced his final paintings here from 1902 to his death in 1906, working daily in a room flooded with light. The studio on Lauves Hill overlooking Aix is being restored and will contain many of his possessions, a permanent legacy of Cézanne 2025. Cézanne adored the light of Provence and once said: 'When you're born there, it's hopeless, nothing else is good enough.' We experience that light ourselves when we tour the abandoned Bibémus quarries where the painter did countless landscapes with the giant sandstone rocks and Mont Sainte-Victoire in the background. A new public trail will be opened leading to the quarries to the east of the city. Replicas of his work are embedded in places he loved, particularly on the Terrain des Peintres, a terrace near his studio where there are nine copies on enamalled plates. You can follow his development through the decades, from his early impressionist paintings to the cubism and abstraction of his latter days, a development that inspired Picasso to call him 'the father of us all'. Visitors will also be able to visit the studio he built, the 'Atelier des Lauves', after being forced to sell Jas de Bouffan in 1899 to give his sisters their share of their father's inheritance. Art and Provence are eternally linked and visitors seeking more cultural enlightenment should make their way to the amazing Chateau La Coste, owned by Irish hotelier and developer Paddy McKillen. It's a working biodynamic vineyard featuring huge art installations by the likes of Damien Hirst and Irish artist Sean Scully, and by famed architects like Tadao Ando from Japan and Brazil's Oscar Niemeyer. Bono's pal, Guggi, features with a giant bronze chalice along with works by Tracey Emin, Yoko Ono, REM's Michael Stipe and many more. We walk through long rows of grapes to reach Bob Dylan's Rail Car, a real American box car set on rail tracks. Once used to transport paper rolls by an Oregon lumber company, its cover has been replaced by a maze of sculptured iron. Dylan said the sight and sound of freight trains was part of his childhood. A short time later we bump into Paddy McKillen's sister Maire, who tells us it was she who originally found the vineyard for her brother in 2002. The Belfast-born chef had settled in Aix because of the quality and range of its foods and herbs and Paddy fell in love with the area while visiting. He asked her to find him a farm. Writer Jim Gallagher with a statue of Paul Cezanna. 'I knew he was serious because he's a real visionary,' says Maire, who retains her soft Belfast accent after decades in France. 'Once I found it, he said, 'this place is too beautiful to keep for ourselves'. 'He loves art and the artistic process and he began to invite people down, people he knew or people whose work he liked like architect Richard Rogers. 'They came because of their love of Provence — and Provence is why we are still here.' Rogers went on to design a spectacular 120m long gallery on a hillside overlooking the chateau and surrounding landscape. Beginning with just a cafe, the estate now has a five-star hotel, a four-star hotel, six restaurants, and the vineyard produces up to 900,000 bottles of wine a year, mostly rosé. The final stop on our Cézanne-inspired art tour is the Gallifet Art Centre in Aix, which specialises in the work of young up-and-coming artists. Nicolas Mazet opened the gallery in his 19th- century home in 2010 and says they show the work of young artists inspired by Cézanne's never-give-up attitude. Cézanne 2025 is a fitting tribute to a painter whose work was forward-looking yet rooted in tradition. The reopening of his house and studio simply give us two more excuses to visit the fabled region and explore the enduring beauty of luminous Aix-en-Provence. Jim was a guest of Aix-en-Provence tourism. Provencal landscape, France, showing Mont Ste Victoire, from the same spot in Aix-en-Provence where Cezanne painted the same landscape as it was in the 19th century. ESCAPE NOTES For more information on the Cézanne celebrations see For more information on visiting Aix and Provence see and Where to stay If you're staying in Aix, a comfortable base is the four-star Hotel Aquabella which has a large outdoor pool, a smaller inside pool and spa with sauna and steam rooms. Its L'Orangerie restaurant serves up a lovely prawn linguine which ticks all my boxes. Where to eat In the city centre, a good place to eat and watch the world go by is the lively terrace of Le Mirabeau, which has very friendly staff. For dinner, the rooftop terrace of La Fromagerie du Passage specialises in cheese dishes. If you want to spoil yourself, try lunch in the beautiful L'Atelier des Lodges, which has a terrace with a spectacular view of Mont Sainte-Victoire. Or try the luxurious Villa Gallici, a five-star Relais & Chateaux hotel based in an 18th-century mansion which won a recent Cézanne menu competition to reinterpret Provencal cuisine. La Taula, its gourmet restaurant, is a haven of style and tranquility overlooking one of the hotel's pools. Artistic inspiration The sculpture park and organic winery at Chateau La Coste is open seven days a week from 10am – 7pm. The walking trail through the 600-acre park is €15. Six restaurants have various opening times. Gallifet Art centre is currently open from noon to 6pm, Wednesday to Saturday, price €6. From June 1, it is open every day except Monday during the summer months. There is also a restaurant, shop and apartment to rent.
