Within walking distance of Les Baux de Provence, is Val d’Enfer (Valley of Hell): the site of old quarries. There you will find an original permanent exhibition entitled "Carrières de Lumières" (formerly "Cathédrale d’Images"). Opened originally in 1977, the show is located in an abandoned limestone quarry.
To the right of the entrance, a large gallery leads you under the mountain, towards a gigantic hall divided by huge pillars left by the quarry-workers to hold up the “roof”. The 7000 square meters (75,000 square feet) of walls and ceilings are used as natural screens to project beautiful, 14 meter-high (45 feet) images.
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| Entrance to the Carrières de Lumières |
Following a program of Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and Raphael, "The Giants of the Renaissance" in 2015, Marc Chagall, "Midsummer Night's Dreams", in 2016, the Carrières de Lumières in 2017 is presenting a multimedia event devoted to Bosch, Brueghel and Arcimboldo, "The Fantastic and Wonderful world of Bosch, Brueghel, Arcimboldo". The program runs from March 4 until January 7, 2018.
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| Carrières de Lumières image |
There are no seats, per se. Audience members walk around, viewing the changing images from different vantage points as their own shadows are eerily cast on the paintings. Sitting on a few concrete slabs around the perimeter, some people huddle together for warmth. Others sit atop a carpet of landscapes and seascapes projected on the ground, with their children dancing beside them.
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| The Garden of Earthly Delights, 1515 by Hieronymus Bosch |
The Carrières de Lumières is open every day. January, March, November, December: 10 AM-6 PM. April, May, June, September, October: 9:30 AM-7 PM. July and August: 9:30 AM-7:30 PM. The last admission is 1 hour before the Carrières closes.
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| Carrières de Lumières image |
Tickets can be purchased at the entrance to the Carrières de Lumières or on their website.
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| Carrières de Lumières image |
The pictures that show the artwork which follow are photographs I took as the program ensued.
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| The Crucifixion of St Julia, 1497 by Hieronymus Bosch |
I should mention that Giuseppe Arcimboldo was an Italian painter best known for creating imaginative portrait heads made entirely of objects such as fruits, vegetables, flowers, fish, and books.
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| Carrières de Lumières image |
Hieronymus Bosch was a Dutch/Netherlandish draftsman and painter from Brabant. He is widely considered one of the most notable representatives of Early Netherlandish painting school. His work is known for its fantastic imagery, detailed landscapes, and illustrations of religious concepts and narratives.
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| The Garden of Earthly Delights, 1515 by Hieronymus Bosch |
Pieter Brueghel was the most significant artist of Dutch and Flemish Renaissance paintings, a painter and printmaker from Brabant, known for his landscapes and peasant scenes.
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| Village festivals by Brueghel |
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| Carrières de Lumières imaged |
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| Carrières de Lumières image |
Don't forget the show takes place inside a huge quarry, and even on the hottest day it is chilly inside, so bring a warm top.
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| Portrait of Adam, 1578 by Giuseppe Arcimboldo |
After watching the program at Les Carrières de Lumières, we went to the village to take a walk around Les Baux.
You will have to pay to park your car near the village. If you don't mind walking, you can park for free along the road leading up to the village.
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| Near the entrance to Les Baux de Provence |
The village is officially classified as one of the Les Plus Beaux Villages de France - one of the most beautiful villages of France. The beauty of the village and surrounding Alpilles, a small range of mountains, makes Les Baux de Provence a very popular place for visitors all year long.
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| A Les Baux de Provence cookie and candy shop |
The name Les Baux refers to its site - in Provençal, a baou is a rocky spur. Aluminum ore bauxite was first discovered near Les Baux in 1822 and named after the village of Les Baux de Provence. Bauxite was mined extensively in the area but by the end of the 20th century, the bauxite had been completely removed.
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| The France tri-color flag flies at the entrance to Les Baux de Provence |
Just inside the village, is the Maison du Roy (King's House), built in 1499. The King's House now houses the Office de Tourisme (Tourist Office).
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| Maison du Roy which houses the Tourist Office |
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| A Les Baux de Provence pottery shop |
The Musée des Santons (Santons Museum), santons are plaster-molded, kiln-fired nativity figurines dressed in traditional Provençal costumes, contains a large number of exhibits including some figurines made in Naples, scenes illustrating the traditions of Provence and Les Baux linked to the Nativity and a documentary film on the manufacture of these figurines.
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| Santons Museum |
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| A courtyard with shops in Les Baux de Provence |
Opposite the Manville residence, there was once a large mansion dating from 1571 (the "Brisson-Peyre" Residence). All that remains of it today is a mullioned window with an entablature bearing a Calvinist inscription, "Post Tenebras Lux 1571" (After the Darkness, Light). This declaration of Protestant faith suggests that there may have been a Reformed Religion house of worship here.
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| The Post Tenebras Lux Window |
The 12th-century Saint Vincent Church is typical of the constructions in Les Baux with its southern section built half into the rock. The nave, which has ribbed barrel vaulting, was extended eastwards in 1609 without breaking the Romanesque harmony of the building as a whole. Inside are some modern stained-glass windows by Max Ingrand (1960), a gift from Prince Rainier III of Monaco. There is also the funeral chapel of the Manville family
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| Saint Vincent Church Belltower |
St. Blaise's Chapel, once used by the wool combers and weavers guild as a meeting place, is now a theater where visitors can watch a free film entitled "A Bird's-Eye View of Provence" which runs non-stop.
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| The Saint-Blaise Chapel |
The plateau on which the castle of Les Baux de Provence sits covers 17.3 acres. The castle contains an exhibition of siege machines including a trebuchet, a couillard (a form of trebuchet with split counterweights and a rotating beam), a bricole (a rotating-beam stone-throwing device), and a battering ram.
The machines are full-sized replicas and the catapults can fire to distances in excess of 200 meters or 650 feet. Firing demonstrations of the siege machines take place daily from April to September.
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| A Siege Weapon known as a Trebuchet |
A windmill was a feudal privilege, built and maintained by the Lords of Les Baux, it was accessible to all. In return for a small payment, farmers would come with their donkeys loaded with wheat, chat with the local folks and leave with their freshly ground flour.
The present day windmill was built on this windy hillside after the Maréchal de Vitry pulled down every windmill in the castle and village in 1632 and faithfully mirrors the image of Provence in the writings of Frédéric Mistral and Alphonse Daudet.
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| The windmill on Les Baux de Provence plateau |
Charloun Rieu was a farmer from Paradou, a Provençal poet nicknamed "Charloun dou Paradou". He is considered one of Provence's most authentic popular poetic voices, he did much to revive Provençal language and culture.
His best known collection is the Chants du Terroir - Songs of the Land, published in 1897.
This monument by the Marseillais sculptor Botinelly was erected in 1930 to commemorate the man who immortalized Les Baux de Provence in verse.
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| The Charloun Rieu monument on Les Baux de Provence plateau |
The ballista seen below could have fired rocks, rotting carcasses or Greek fire. Greek fire was a mixture of saltpeter, sulfur, resin and other fusible materials that would stick to objects and burn them, and was much feared in the Middle Ages.
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| The Ballista |
The battering ram was recently restored. 26 feet long, it was used to break down the gates of towns and fortresses, whilst protecting the assailants under its heavy wheeled framework from projectiles, even if they were on fire. Its framework was covered with flame-resistant materials: manure, earth, long grass, etc.
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| The Battering Ram |
The first part of the ruined castle of Les Baux you come across coming from the desolate plateau is the Saracen Tower (Tour Sarrasine) with a battering ram at its foot. Its name derives from the threat faced by Les Baux from an invasion of the Saracens. The tower was then part of an ingenious system of defense conceived to mislead the invaders were they to enter the citadel.
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| The Saracen Tower |
The first lower courtyard provided access to the feudal lord's dwellings. Here were people dressed in armor and fine dresses, and also the servants who brought the bread for baking in the Maison du Four (Oven House) and collected water from the cistern. The guards also lived in this part of the castle.
The atmosphere was completely different in the second lower courtyard, in which the artisans and peasants lived and worked. Separated from the first lower courtyard by a ditch, the houses formed a veritable village within the castle’s protective walls.
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| The Lower Courtyard |
The Paravelle Tower is situated at the north-west corner of the outer walls. It was erected in a hewn rock and then built up to provide crenellations and arrow slits. This tower watched over the Fontaine valley, the Val d’Enfer (valley of hell) and in particular the Vayède pass, whose high elevation made it an especially suitable place from which to lay siege. From the pass, the entire Castle would have been within shot of siege engines.
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| The Paravelle Tower |
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| Les Baux Chateau |
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| Gwen was the only one who was adventuresome enough to climb to the top of Les Baux |
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| The Paravelle Tower with the entrance to the former chapel in the chateau visible to the left |
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| The Paravelle Tower to the left |
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| Les Baux de Provence |
Built at the same time as the keep, the dovecotes have been singularly carved on the rock wall. More than 2,000 pigeonholes were carved out and the birds’ eggs were collected using a ladder.
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| Castle of Les Baux |
The best remnant of the military architecture of Les Baux Castle, the keep was built at the highest point of the plateau, overlooking the whole citadel.
The lower level houses one room while the second has three, all shaped out from the rock.
If you venture up to explore the castle, you will be able to see traces of structures that used to make it an impregnable fortress: arches, doors and windows, holes (where beams were previously fixed), sculpted corbels.
The keep is accessible by a giddy and difficult stairway and the view from its top is one of the most impressive in all of Provence.
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| The Baux de Provence Castle Keep |
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| Les Baux de Provence Chateau |
The town's finest Renaissance mansion was built in 1571 for a rich protestant family headed by Claude de Manville. The irregular frontage following the line of the main street contains many wide mullioned windows, ensuring plenty of light for the interior. The inner courtyard with its porticos repeats the same ordered layout as the Renaissance mullions. The mansion has been restored and is now the Town Hall.
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| Manville Mansion (Town Hall) |
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| Stone seal |
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| Les Baux de Provence house |
The Carrières de Lumières program was an extraordinary experience for Shirley and I. For a few days in July, August and September, the Carrières de Lumières will reprise Klimt and Vienna, A Century of Gold and Color (2014), Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, Raphael, the giants of the Renaissance (2015), and Chagall: Midsummer Nights’ Dreams (2016). Don't hesitate to go. The Carrières de Lumières shows are well worth the time and modest admission fee.
A bientot folks. I will be back with another post soon. As I mentioned previously, we still have May 27-June 24 and September 1-9 and September 23-30 available for rent of our home in Sablet France if you are still looking for a house for this summer. Please contact me for special rental rates.
