Real estate Saint Tropez

Musee de l'Annonciade
If everything about St-Tropez in the summerfills you with dismay, let this beyour reason to visit. Housed in a in the 17th century chapel next to the port.the museum concentrates on works by painters in Paul Signac's St-Tropez circle, post impressionists and Fauves who began whereVan Cogh and Gauguin left off and blazed the trail for Cubism - and blaze their works do, saturated with colour that takes on a lite of its own with Vlaminck (Le Pont de Chatou) and Derain {Westminster Palace and Waterloo Bridge). Seurat's small but fascinating Canal des Gravelines (1890), the oldest painting of the collection.gives an idea of his mathematical, optical treatment of lmpressionism,a style from which his disciple, Signac, moved away while in St-Tropez.<br />
The collection started out in a one-room gallery in the town hall, known by its Provencal name.the Museon TropoIen, but soon outgrew its cramped quarters and was moved tothe disused chapel by the port. It had belonged tothe Penitents Blancs, who took care of fishermen maimed in fishing accidents, but was taken over during the anti-clerical fervour of the Revolution and used first for storing sails.then for building boats, and finally to house orphans, before sinking into disuse. After the Second World War the chapel was gutted and restored, uncovering lovely originai features like the nave and choir.<br />
Other highlights include Braque's Paysagede l'Estaque, painted in homage to Cezanne; Matisse's La Citane (1906); Vuillard's Deux Femmes sous la lampe; Bonnard's Nue devant la cheminee and La Route rose-, and key works by Van Dongen, Friesz, Dufy, Marquetand Evoss. Upstairs, loafers lounge in leather armchairs among Aristide Maillol's graceful sculptures and gaze out through Windows fra ming sky and sea far a bove the crowds and bustle.