The Moulin de la Galette is a windmill and associated businesses situated near the top of the district of Montmartre in Paris. Since the 17th century the windmill has been known for more than just its milling capabilities. Nineteenth-century owners and millers, the Debray family, made a brown bread, galette, which became popular and thus the name of the windmill and its businesses, which have included a famous guinguette and restaurant. In the 19th century, Le Moulin de la Galette represented diversion for Parisians seeking entertainment, a glass of wine and bread made from flour ground by the windmill. Artists, such as Renoir, van Gogh, Ramón Casas [1] and Pissarro have immortalized Le Moulin de la Galette; likely the most notable was Renoir's festive painting, Bal du moulin de la Galette .
The windmill Moulin de la Galette, also known as Blute-fin, was built in 1622. [2] [3] The name Blute-fin comes from the French verb bluter which means sifting flour for the separation from bran.
The Debray family acquired the two mills in 1809 for producing flour, the Blute-fin and the Radet, built in 1717. But it was also used to pressurize the harvest or grind materials needed for manufacturing.
An association Friends of Old Montmartre saved it from destruction in 1915. In 1924, its owner moved the windmill to the corner of Girardon and Lepic streets. It was restored in 1978, but is not running. The windmill has been classified as a monument since 1958. [4]
At the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1814, during the siege of Paris three Debray men lost their lives defending the windmill against Cossacks; the miller was killed and nailed to the wings of the windmill. [5]
During the Franco-Prussian War Montmartre was attacked by 20,000 Prussian soldiers. During the siege, Pierre-Charles Debray was killed and nailed to the wings of the windmill. [6] A mass grave for those killed during the siege was made just steps away from the Moulin de la Galette. [5]
The mill was turned into a guinguette by the surviving son of the miller killed during the siege of Paris in 1814. [7]
The current name Moulin de la Galette is based upon galette , a small brown bread that the Debray millers, who owned the mill in the 19th century, made and sold with a glass of milk. The tasty bread became so popular that it later became the name of the windmill. [5] In 1830, they replaced milk with wine (especially the local Montmartre wine) and the windmill became a cabaret. [6] Parisians made their way to Montmartre to enjoy "the simple pleasures" of the countryside with a glass of wine, freshly baked bread and a terrace view of Paris and the Seine below. In 1833, one of the Debrays decided to open an area for dancing, dedicated to the Greek muse Terpsichore. His flair for dancing and enthusiasm attracted patrons to the dancing hall and it became a success. [8]
Author Émile Zola wrote in 1876, "We rushed off into the countryside to celebrate the joy of not having to listen to any more talk about politics," which often meant reflection of France's defeat in the Franco-Prussian War. Montmartre, attainable by a train ride or a one-hour walk, was still a village with orchards, shops and two remaining windmills. [5]
As the nearby fields were replaced with housing and factories, Nicholas Charles Debray sought commercial opportunities to remain a going concern. One of the windmills was turned into a viewing tower and a dance hall was opened adjacently. People came to the relaxed, popular Moulin de la Galette for entertainment and dancing. [5]
Over its history, the building has experienced a wide range of uses: open-air cafe, music-hall, television studios and restaurant. It is now a private property. The windmill Radet, however, marks the entrance to a bistro named Le Moulin de la Galette. [6]
The area has been depicted by artists such as Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Vincent van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, [3] Ramon Casas, [9] Paul François Quinsac, [10] Kees van Dongen [11] and Maurice Utrillo. [12]
Pierre-Auguste Renoir was a French artist who was a leading painter in the development of the Impressionist style. As a celebrator of beauty and especially feminine sensuality, it has been said that "Renoir is the final representative of a tradition which runs directly from Rubens to Watteau."
Moulin Rouge is a cabaret in Paris, on Boulevard de Clichy, at Place Blanche, the intersection of, and terminus of Rue Blanche.
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.
Comte Henri Marie Raymond de Toulouse-Lautrec-Monfa, known as Toulouse-Lautrec, was a French painter, printmaker, draughtsman, caricaturist, and illustrator whose immersion in the colourful and theatrical life of Paris in the late 19th century allowed him to produce a collection of enticing, elegant, and provocative images of the sometimes decadent affairs of those times.
Maurice Utrillo, born Maurice Valadon; 26 December 1883 – 5 November 1955), was a French painter of the School of Paris who specialized in cityscapes. From the Montmartre quarter of Paris, France, Utrillo is one of the few famous painters of Montmartre to have been born there.
Suzanne Valadon was a French painter who was born Marie-Clémentine Valadon at Bessines-sur-Gartempe, Haute-Vienne, France. In 1894, Valadon became the first woman painter admitted to the Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts. She was also the mother of painter Maurice Utrillo.
La Goulue, was the stage name of Louise Weber, a French can-can dancer who was a star of the Moulin Rouge, a popular cabaret in the Pigalle district of Paris, near Montmartre. Weber became known as La Goulue because as an adolescent, she was known for guzzling cabaret patrons' drinks while dancing. She also was referred to as the Queen of Montmartre.
Bal du moulin de la Galette is an 1876 painting by French artist Pierre-Auguste Renoir.
Ramon Casas i Carbó was a Catalan artist. Living through a turbulent time in the history of his native Barcelona, he was known as a portraitist, sketching and painting the intellectual, economic, and political elite of Barcelona, Paris, Madrid, and beyond. He was also known for his paintings of crowd scenes ranging from the audience at a bullfight to the assembly for an execution to rioters in the Barcelona streets. Also a graphic designer, his posters and postcards helped to define the Catalan art movement known as modernisme.
The Café des 2 Moulins is a café in the Montmartre area of Paris, located at the junction of Rue Lepic and Rue Cauchois. It takes its name from the two nearby historical windmills, Moulin Rouge and Moulin de la Galette. The interior consists of a bar area and multiple small tables.
Valentin le Désossé was the stage name of Jacques Renaudin, a French can-can dancer who was a star of the Moulin Rouge in the 1890s as the partner of Louise Weber, known as La Goulue.
Jules Émile Élisée Maclet was a French Impressionist painter, particularly known for his views of Montmartre.
Rue Lepic is a street in the former commune of Montmartre, in the 18th arrondissement of Paris, climbing the hill of Montmartre from the Boulevard de Clichy to Place Jean-Baptiste-Clément.
The Musée de Montmartre is located in Montmartre, at 8-14 rue Cortot in the 18th (XVIII) arrondissement of Paris, France. It was founded in 1960 and was classified as a Musée de France in 2003. The buildings were formerly the home of several famous artists, including Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Suzanne Valadon.
Le Moulin de la Galette is the title of several paintings made by Vincent van Gogh in 1886 of a windmill, the Moulin de la Galette, which was near Van Gogh and his brother Theo's apartment in Montmartre. The owners of the windmill maximized the view on the butte overlooking Paris, creating a terrace for viewing and a dance hall for entertainment.
The Montmartre paintings are a group of works that Vincent van Gogh created in 1886 and 1887 of the Paris district of Montmartre while living there, at 54 Rue Lepic, with his brother Theo. Rather than capture urban settings in Paris, van Gogh preferred pastoral scenes, such as Montmartre and Asnières in the northwest suburbs. Of the two years in Paris, the work from 1886 often has the dark, somber tones of his early works from the Netherlands and Brussels. By the spring of 1887, van Gogh embraced use of color and light and created his own brushstroke techniques based upon Impressionism and Pointillism. The works in the series provide examples of his work during that period of time and the progression he made as an artist.
The Swing is an 1876 oil-on-canvas painting by the French artist Pierre-Auguste Renoir who was a leading exponent of the Impressionist style. The painting measures 92 x 73 centimetres and is in the Musée d’Orsay. Renoir executed the painting in what are now the Musée de Montmartre gardens. He had rented a cottage in the gardens so that he could be closer to the Moulin de la Galette where he was engaged in painting his 1896 Bal du moulin de la Galette.
Frédéric Samuel Cordey (1854–1911) was a French landscape painter who was a part of the Impressionist movement. He was a close friend of Auguste Renoir, and had a personal fortune that allowed him to work according to his taste, regardless of the publicity and support provided by art dealers.
Bal du Moulin de la Galette is an oil on canvas painting by Spanish painter Ramon Casas, created between 1890 and 1891. It is held at the Cau Ferrat Museum in Sitges, Barcelona.
Media related to Moulin de la Galette at Wikimedia Commons