The Cirque Medrano (in English: Circus Medrano) is a French circus that was located at 63 Boulevard de Rochechouart, at the corner of rue des Martyrs, in the 18th arrondissement at the edge of Montmartre in Paris. It was originally called Cirque Fernando. The title "Cirque Medrano" is still active today: it is now a successful French traveling circus.
The Parisian circus was created by a Belgian circus entrepreneur, Ferdinand Beert (1835-1902), known as Fernando, and was built at the corner of the Boulevard de Rochechouart and the Rue des Martyrs, in what was then the edge of the City of Paris, under the name "Cirque Fernando." The area was a working-class neighborhood at the foot of the hill of Montmartre, famous for its many places of popular entertainment, among which the Moulin de la Galette and the famous Bal du Moulin Rouge — and in the vicinity of the Bateau-Lavoir in Montmartre, where many young painters lived.
An acrobat and equestrian, Fernando started his Cirque Fernando in Vierzon, France, in 1872. The following year, he came to Paris to perform at the Fête de Montmartre, but the traditional fairgrounds for this annual fair were on the very spot on which the Church of the Sacré-Cœur was being built. Fernando thus went on to search for a suitable empty lot nearby, and found it on the Boulevard de Rochechouart, between the rue des Martyrs and the present rue Viollet-le-Duc. He had considerable success there, which went far beyond the context of the fair. He therefore managed to obtain a thirty-year lease on his piece of land to build a permanent circus. Designed by the architect Gustave Gridaine, the new Cirque Fernando opened on June 25, 1875.
Because of its proximity to Montmartre, the circus attracted many artists (Renoir, Degas, Lautrec, among many others), who came to sketch the performers in action, which sometimes resulted in full paintings. They brought in their wake members of the Parisian "bohème", writers, journalists, actors, who generated publicity for the circus. Mrs. Fernando, who oversaw the box office, decided to let the painters work freely in the circus during rehearsals and watch the performances free of charge — a tradition that will remain under the subsequent management of Gerónimo Medrano.
Fernando Beert eventually gave the management of his circus to his stepson, Louis, known as Louis Fernando (1851-?). Although Louis's artistic direction proved quite successful, notably with popular revues written for his star clown, Gerónimo Medrano (1849-1912), known as "Boum-Boum," his financial management of the family's enterprise was often erratic. He eventually led the circus to bankruptcy in October 1897. In the following December, Gerónimo Medrano bought back Fernando's lease, and renamed the circus Cirque Medrano.
Gerónimo Medrano successfully revived the circus of the Boulevard de Rochechouart. It remained a meeting point for artists: Picasso, Braque, Kees van Dongen were regulars. Medrano managed the circus until his death in 1912. Then, his wife, Berthe (née Perrin,1876-1920), took over the circus, and gave the artistic management to Rodolphe Bonten, a former acrobat. Gerónimo and Berthe had a son, Jérôme Medrano (1907-1998), who was five years old when his father died. To ensure her son's future, Berthe, whose health was deteriorating, remarried with Rodolphe Bonten. Jérôme was given a formal education in elite schools that had not much to do with the circus.
During World War I, Bonten hired a trio of clowns, the Fratellinis, who soon became the Idols of Paris and ensured Medrano's financial success. When Berthe Medrano died of cancer in 1920, Rodolphe Bonten took over the full management of the circus, but the lease actually reverted to Jérôme Medrano, who was only thirteen. Bonten's management was sound, if not overly imaginative (he let the Fratellinis go to his main competition, Paris's Cirque d'Hiver, in 1924), and Cirque Medrano continued to thrive. It was still a favorite rendez-vous for the Parisian artistic elite — and still attracted many artists, who were always welcome around the ring.
During World War II and the German Occupation of France, the lease of the Cirque Medrano, which, since Fernando's bankruptcy, included the land as well as the walls, was put for sale. Jérôme Medrano had joined the French Resistance, and was not in a position to buy his circus back; the wealthy Bouglione family, owners of Paris's Cirque d'Hiver, bought the land and the walls from their rightful owners, the Saint family, paying them in gold! At the end of the War, Jérôme Medrano found himself being the tenant of his main competitors.
From one lawsuit to another, Jérôme Medrano managed to stay at the helm of his circus until the end of 1962, when the Bougliones finally took possession of the building. During that time, he continued to give remarkable shows, with such guest stars as Buster Keaton, Grock, Achille Zavatta, Charlie Rivel, the famous French comedian Fernand Raynaud, and even the tap-dancer Harold Nicholas. The Cirque Medrano gave its last performance on January 7, 1963, in front of a house packed with the Tout-Paris and a crowd of disconsolate Parisians, habitués, circus fans, and friends from the neighborhood.
The Bougliones revived the circus for a couple of seasons under the name Cirque de Montmartre, but the magic was gone. Although their shows were commendable, they were mostly a replica of what could be seen at the Cirque d'Hiver. They rented the building for a short while to Ariane Mnouchkine's Théâtre du Soleil, and then to a Fête de la Bière—a sort of Bavarian beer-hall. The building slowly went into a state of disrepair. The Bougliones demolished it in December 1974: in 1975, it would have been one-hundred years old and become a protected landmark... A nondescript apartment building called The Bouglione now occupies the site.
Edgar Degas, the French Impressionist artist, painted Miss La La at the Cirque Fernando in 1879, now in the National Gallery in London . Auguste Renoir, another Impressionist artist, painted Jugglers at the Cirque Fernando , which is at the Art Institute of Chicago. Georges Seurat's pointillist painting The Circus (1891) also depicts the Cirque Fernando. In the late 19th century, the Parisian post-impressionist artist Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec also attended the Cirque Medrano and produced many drawing and pastels depicting its performances . Later, Pablo Picasso made many study-sketches at the Cirque Medrano for his Pink Period series of acrobats. Fernand Léger painted Le Cirque Medrano (1918), which is in the collections of the Musée d'Art Moderne in Paris, and published a full album of drawings and paintings titled Cirque (1950), for which his sketched his subjects at the Cirque Medrano. There are many other painters who used the Cirques Fernando and Medrano, and their performers, as their subjects.
Circus entrepreneur Raoul Gibault leased the Medrano name rights from Jérôme and Violette Medrano and, to this day, his Cirque Medrano-Raoul Gibault has toured France with a big top. His organization has several units that travel under the Medrano title, including Medrano's Cirque sur l'eau (water circus) and Medrano's Cirque de Saint Petersbourg (St. Petersburg Circus). [2]
In Henry Miller's 1934 novel, Tropic of Cancer , Cirque Médrano is mentioned as one of the places that he would visit with his expat friend, Carl. Medrano has also appeared in several French popular novels, in songs, and in films (notably during the German Occupation period).
Montmartre is a large hill in Paris's northern 18th arrondissement. It is 130 m (430 ft) high and gives its name to the surrounding district, part of the Right Bank. Montmartre is primarily known for its artistic history, for the white-domed Basilica of the Sacré-Cœur on its summit, and as a nightclub district.
The 11th arrondissement of Paris is one of the 20 arrondissements of the capital city of France. In spoken French, the arrondissement is referred to as le onzième.
The Place Pigalle is a public square located in the 9th arrondissement of Paris, between the Boulevard de Clichy and the Boulevard de Rochechouart, near Sacré-Cœur, at the foot of the Montmartre hill.
Anvers is a station on Line 2 of the Paris Métro. It is located in Montmartre, on the border of the 9th and the 18th arrondissements.
Oberkampf is a station of the Paris Métro, serving Lines 5 and 9 and located in the 11th arrondissement of Paris.
Grands Boulevards, formerly named Rue Montmartre (1931–1998), is a station on Lines 8 and 9 of the Paris Métro. In 2019, it was the 44th busiest station of the Métro network, with 6,807,424 yearly users.
Le Chat Noir was a 19th century entertainment establishment in the bohemian Montmartre district of Paris. It was opened on 18 November 1881 at 84 Boulevard de Rochechouart by impresario Rodolphe Salis, and closed in 1897 not long after Salis' death.
Annie Violette Fratellini was a French circus artist, singer, film actress and clown.
The Cirque Olympique in Paris, also known as the Cirque Franconi, was an equestrian theatre company, founded in 1782 by Philip Astley, the English inventor of the modern circus ring, and was initially known as the Cirque d'Astley or the Cirque Anglais.
The Cirque d'Hiver, located at 110 rue Amelot, has been a prominent venue for circuses, exhibitions of dressage, musical concerts, and other events, including exhibitions of Turkish wrestling and even fashion shows. The theatre was designed by the architect Jacques Ignace Hittorff and was opened by Emperor Napoleon III on 11 December 1852 as the Cirque Napoléon. The orchestral concerts of Jules Etienne Pasdeloup were inaugurated at the Cirque Napoléon on 27 October 1861 and continued for more than twenty years. The theatre was renamed Cirque d'Hiver in 1870.
The Passage des Panoramas is the oldest of the covered passages of Paris, France located in the 2nd arrondissement between the Montmartre boulevard to the North and Saint-Marc street to the south. It is one of the earliest venues of the Parisian philatelic trade, and it was one of the first covered commercial passageways in Europe. Bazaars and souks in the Orient had roofed commercial passageways centuries earlier but the Passage de Panoramas innovated in having glazed roofing and, later on, in 1817, gas lights for illumination. It was an ancestor of the city gallerias of the 19th century and the covered suburban and city shopping malls of the 20th century.
The Boulevard Marguerite-de-Rochechouart is a street in Paris, France, situated at the foot of Montmartre and to its south. Like the neighbouring street, it is named after Marguerite de Rochechouart de Montpipeau (1665–1727), abbess of Montmartre. It is a result of the 1864 merging of the boulevards and chemins de ronde which followed the interior and exterior of the Wall of the Farmers-General. It has also been known as the boulevard des Poissonniers, chemin de ronde de Poissonnière and chemin de ronde de Rochechouart. It is served by the Paris Metro stations Pigalle, Anvers and Barbès – Rochechouart.
Louis Rodolphe Salis was the creator, host and owner of the Le Chat Noir cabaret. With this establishment Salis is remembered as the creator of the modern cabaret: a nightclub where the patrons could sit at tables with alcoholic drinks and enjoy variety acts on a stage, introduced by a master of ceremonies who interacted with the audience.
The Rue des Martyrs is a street that passes through the 9th and 18th arrondissements of Paris, France.
Family of Saltimbanques is a 1905 oil on canvas painting by Pablo Picasso. The work depicts six saltimbanques, a kind of itinerant circus performer, in a desolate landscape. It is considered the masterpiece of Picasso's Rose Period, sometimes called his circus period. The painting is housed in the collection of the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.
The Vesque Sisters were two French artist sisters, Marthe and Juliette, who, between 1900 and 1949, frequented Parisian circuses and documented circus life and performances in well-executed paintings. The sisters attended weekly shows where the performers were sketched live at both circus and variety theaters. Their records constitute a unique documentation of European circus in the first half of the twentieth century. Their extensive journal entries from 1904 to 1947 added fascinating information and insights, written in a vigorous style and teeming with gossip about the circus community, with a marvellous eye for detail.
The Circus is an oil on canvas painting by Georges Seurat. It was his last painting, made in a Neo-Impressionist style in 1890–91, and remained unfinished at his death in March 1891. The painting is located at the Musée d'Orsay in Paris.
Rosa Bouglione was a French circus performer and the matriarch of the Bouglione circus family.
Famille d'acrobates avec singe is a 1905 painting by Pablo Picasso. It depicts a family of travelling circus performers during an intimate moment. The work was produced on cardboard using mixed media: gouache, watercolour, pastel and Indian ink. It is held by the Gothenburg Museum of Art in Gothenburg, Sweden. The work was painted at a key phase in Picasso's life, as he made the transition from an impoverished bohemian at the start of 1905 to a successful artist by the end of 1906.
The Clown Bar is a bistro at 114 Rue Amelot in the 11th arrondissement of Paris. It has been classed as a monument historique since 1995.
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