Béziers has gone the extra mile when it comes to walking trails around the town. Not content with taking you past major historical sights, they’ve created a wonderful route of trompe l’œil frescoes that tell different stories from the town’s history. The trompe l’oeil, or trick the eye, paintings appear on the sides of buildings and create a 3-D illusion for passersby. There are nineteen of them, and they are fabulous.
I’m a big street art fan but it’s quite rare to come across pieces that use the trompe l’oeil style, so this was a real treat. Designed to look realistic, it’s unlikely you’d be fooled by a medieval knight hanging out of a window with a large sword, but if you’re not paying attention it would be fairly easy to mistake others for real people, windows, balconies, doors or shop fronts.
The frescoes are very complex and require significant planning to execute. The person behind them is Patrick Commecy and his team from Lyon. They have created over 400 frescoes around France, a lot of which are in the south or along the Mediterranean coast. On further investigation, there seems to be a flourishing trompe l’œil fresco scene, much of it centred on Lyon.
The tourist office has a map that you can use to find the paintings, it’s not the most detailed so our explorations ended up being more like a treasure hunt. It was a good way to explore the town and took us into areas we might otherwise have missed. Some of the highlights were the painting of the Winegrowers’ Revolt of 1907. The uprising began as a result of massive social and economic upheaval in the south of France.
There were complex issues leading to the revolt: the loss of vineyards to phylloxera blight and competition from foreign wine makers, as well as the spread of socialist and collectivist movements, drove the upheaval. The government responded with military force, but were eventually forced to introduce new laws that led to better conditions. The same model of protest is still being used today.
Other frescoes celebrate locals such as Jean Moulin, a hero of the French Resistance. Born in Béziers in 1899, his bravery was legendary up to the point in 1943 when he was betrayed, captured and tortured to death. Another is of acclaimed sculptor Jean-Antoine Injalbert, born in Béziers in 1845. The most intriguing though is of L’Arlésienne, depicting Marie Caufoppe, known as ‘the woman from Arles’ or ‘L’Arlésienne’.
L’Arlésienne is seen on a balcony looking over the street from a building on the same spot where she was born. Below her in a cafe are composer Georges Bizet, and writers Léon Daudet and Frédéric Mistral. The story is tragic, L’Arlésienne’s infidelities are said to have led to Mistral’s nephew committing suicide. Bizet and Daudet used the story to inspire their work.
The picture of playwright, Molière, celebrates the creation of his play Le Dépit amoureux. Written in Béziers for the Prince of Conti in 1656. Other images include another Béziers Resistance hero, Honoré d’Estienne d’Orves, as well as a lovely frescoe of Antoine Moulin, father of Jean and local school teacher. We missed the fresco of the famous locks on the Canal du Midi, but did see one of the first train to arrive in Béziers.
It’s understandable that there is a notable fresco omission. A defining event in medieval Béziers was the arrival of a crusader army at the city walls in 1209. Under orders from Pope Innocent III, the crusaders were to destroy the Cathars, a religious sect the Catholic Church viewed as heretical. It resulted in the massacre of 20,000 innocent people. I can’t imagine the town council was too keen to depict the slaughter.
Wow! Those are really fantastic – like you, I love street art, and these are just amazing.
They’re absolutely brilliant, such a good idea – even when hunting them down in 36C heat.