Joseph and the Beaux Arts Ball Paris, 1965
His top hat, her bustle - intertwined - a grand eloquent 1890’s dance! Posters glued on historic stone buildings and tacked to each tree in the 5th, 6th and 7th arrondissements announce the “Bal Costumé de l’Ecole des Beaux Arts”.*
Our tale unfolds humbly as Tosho has one more year to be ‘in-scribed’ as an art student, aging out soon and we scrape together the price of two tickets, but no francs for formalwear. We are resourceful...with help from Joseph.
* * * * * * * *
Joseph is a hawker, a peddler with a hand cart, la charrette à bras; he has no horse. Bent over, he pushes his heavy two wheeled oversized barrow along the backstreets, ‘des ruelles’, of Paris. It’s piled higher than he stands, laden with merchandise some term ‘junk’. He stops under our third floor studio window on rue Princesse in the 6éme, shouldering his cart. It’s a bygone mode of ‘door to door’ delivery. Tosho is ever alert to Joseph’s banging pan, ringing bell, and rhythmic calls of what he has for sale. We await a bargain, buried under the jumble of layers, from this purveyor of ‘recycled’ goods. Joseph awaits a ‘bargainer’ with stone-faced enticement.
Each day Joseph must ferret out odds and ends for la charrette à bras and refill it to overflowing. We wonder how he then traverses Paris to arrive at the rue Princesse in the 6éme. It’s almost an hour trip by metro from the northern edge of the 18th arrondissement, down and up stairs, miles from the Porte de Clignancourt to Odeon on the Left Bank where he calls up to the chambres de bonnes at the tops of small buildings in the 5th, 6th or 7th arrondissements. He plies an ancient trade; peddlers travel as they work with no fixed place, akin to Tosho who travels as he sketches on the metro, bus or on foot, a restive dessinateur.
After burrowing through the hodgepodge, we’ve garnered a 30’s brown velvet lady’s hat for me, a round metal standup alarm clock, a bald mannequin head Tosho will use for ‘inspiration’ in his drawings, all for a few francs. In the course of conversation, there are stories, questions and an invitation to visit Joseph in his apartment at the Porte de Clignancourt.
* * * * * * * *
Early one morning Tosho and I traverse the whole of Paris, underground, a long subterranean metro ride to the 18éme arrondissement, Pte de Clignancourt. Plenty for Tosho to sketch in the sea of diverse faces during 50 minutes on the metro. Finally, rising up escalators and stairs we land across from Paris’ most famous flea market, Les Puces (literally, ‘fleas') de Saint-Ouen, a kaleidoscopic maze covering seven hectares, the world’s largest antique market. Pathway after pathway of rickety stalls are piled with colorfully painted statues, rusted tools, empire furniture, used clothes and linens, not necessarily ‘vintage’. Tosho is sure footed as we wade through tangled stands while hawkers shout out their treasures to cajole us. My mind warns “Don’t look in their direction or you’re caught in their eye web and drawn into their lair”. I cling to his arm as we evade them and cross the boulevard to Joseph’s nondescript high-rise block, locate his grey building, and mount 5 flights of stairs. We knock. The door opens to a furnished set for a 1950’s play, simple couch, rectangular table, bookcase, and a console radio.
Once inside his two rooms, Joseph seats us at his tiny, tinny kitchen table and serves us a glass of hot tea and LU Petit Beurre cookies. He and Tosho confer as if they meet here often to discuss life’s quandaries. How do these two rare individuals recognize each other’s souls? Tosho instinctively elicits personal stories later to transcribe into the aura of his dark sketches. Joseph, who finds treasures among the stalls of St. Ouen, finds a gentle gem of warmth in Tosho beneath his bravado. Stories are told. Joseph speaks quietly of his birth in Poland. He doesn’t tell how he survived the war as a Jew in the Eastern block or in Paris. Perhaps, by bartering goods from trash he unearthed? This father, who rummages around the flea market daily to fill his hand cart with the stuff to sell in our neighborhood on the Left Bank, unabashedly rings and shouts his new finds from the street. That could have been his lifeline in the war. Downcast, he does say he has a son in Israel whom he doesn’t see much. Yes, Joseph has been to Israel. His son doesn’t visit him in Paris. We imagine this son embarrassed by his father’s work.
Here’s Joseph in People, Alfred Eisenstaedt, 1973, Viking Press Inc, NYC, The Macmillan Co ofCanada , p.219.**
A grimace and tongue stuck out at the famous photographer! With the caption: “Some people don’t like to be photographed.” I laugh. These two, Joseph and Tosho, stick their tongues out at the world and ply their trades with delight.
* * * * * * * *
Back to the Ball. His top hat, her bustle - intertwined - a grand eloquent 1890’s dance. Posters are glued onto historic stone buildings and tacked to each tree in the 5th, 6th and 7th arrondissements announcing the “Bal Costumé de l’Ecole des Beaux Arts”. Bal des Quat'z'Arts ("Four Arts Ball") a Parisian annual ball, the first held in 1892 and the last in 1966. The event was organized by Henri Guillaume, Professor of Architecture at the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts for students of architecture, painting, sculpture, and engraving.
Our formalwear: Joseph uncovered a black tuxedo for Tosho for the Beaux Arts Ball. Tosho’s tux from the pushcart was neither up-to-date nor truly vintage. Joseph later dug out an old tuxedo shirt and a black bow tie. We shined his only pair of black leather shoes and called them ‘formal’.
My dress was a floor-sweeping maroon satin and crepe leftover bridesmaid gown, the one I wore in Susan’s wedding, Youngstown, Ohio. It came to Paris in my large gray leather suitcase with red piping, in 1964; then, was left behind while I hitchhiked to Greece. My musty dress was retrieved from storage under the bed for this gala.
Not quite 1890’s and not quite 1960’s, but we felt dressed for the ball! Tosho and I looked at each other as if we were the prince and princess in Cinderella. Then, we arrived. We were completely out of style as we wandered past well-off art students or poor artists and their patrons. My dress was nothing like the Parisian debutantes gossamer haute couture gowns. Did we have shoes that matched our outfits? Or, did we scuffle along expecting the dimmed lights and dusky atmosphere to obscure our footwear?
After a drink or two, we turned around and around in the mysterious atmosphere as if we’d never been inside that venerable institution where Tosho spent months in its art studios. We danced through the winding dark cavernous hallways and byways in the Beaux Arts buildings that night. The stone walls and circular stone stairways were lit by sconces with candles and a few massive iron candelabras in the corners of the ballrooms. We slid past the chic set and past black clad waifs and artists in elaborate patchwork costumes. We glided through this 400 year old institution, left our palace and wandered out onto the quai Malaquais into the seductive Paris night air.
* * * * * * * *
End Notes
**Serendipitously, much later, at Gilbert Jeune, the student bookstore on Boulevard St. Michel (Boul Mich’) I dig though discounted photography albums and come across Alfred Eisenstadt’s People. Famous photos of Marilyn, of Chaplin, of Sophia, Dukes and Duchesses attract me. And, Joseph. With his cart. In daylight views from within and out this 400 year old institution onto the quay were dramatically different fromour magic night there. This was our ‘neighborhood’. On the corner of rue de Seine and rue Jacques Callot is La Palette, now a national historic landmark. Down the street was “La Maison des Beaux-Arts,” Centre Regional des Oeuvres Universitaires et Scolaires, 11, rue des Beaux-Arts, Paris VI, Tel: 033-10-99 Tochkovitch dessins - collages - pastels Exposition du 21 février au 5 mars 1966 The night of 25 février 1966 was the vernissage (private opening) of the Tochkovitch exhibit
©Linda Tobin
