Sunday Afternoon, Quimper

On Sunday afternoon, we drove to the beautiful city of Quimper about forty minutes from Pont Aven. The cathedral is beautiful with remains of the old city walls around the outside giving it a wonderful prospect from the river. 

Here is a detail of the flying buttresses.

                                                              Gauguin loved the local style of polychromed carving used in many of the churches.

Here is another example from the cathedral.

The local museum has a wonderful collection of Pont Aven school paintings

but they also have a wonderful new central hall built to hold a set of murals 

painted in a local hotel and moved here when the hotel was demolished. 

The murals depict life in Bretagne with scenes of fishing and farming done in the same palette Gauguin would develop with its bold use of maroon and yellow orange. 

The museum has some of the artifacts from the rooming house in le Poldu where Gauguin stayed including this barrel he carved. 

Betsy is standing in a beautiful garden terraced in the remains of some of the old city walls.