Description of the attraction
The Nimble Rabbit Cabaret occupies a funny little house in Montmartre, pink with turquoise trim. How do the hall and stage fit there? And they are not. In fact, this is a cramped casual cafe, over wooden tables - lamps in lampshades with fringes, no one dances cancan. The pianist is playing, the Parisian chansonniers sing songs to the accompaniment of a guitar and an accordion - either old, or Piaf, or drinking in chorus with the audience. However, you cannot get here from the street, you need to book a table in advance, because this is not just a cafe, this is the history of Montmartre.
At first, the village eatery was called the Killers' Cabaret. In 1880, a cartoonist and chansonnier Andre Gilles, who sang in a cabaret, drew a new sign for him. On it, a peppy rabbit, holding a bottle on its paw, jumps out of a ladle. A special humor was in the play on words: lapin - "rabbit", agile - "agile", and together it can be read as lapin à Gill - "Gilles rabbit".
Parisian bohemians came to the cabaret: Picasso, Toulouse-Lautrec, Renoir, Verlaine, Apollinaire, Modigliani, Utrillo. Young beggar talents, unknown to anyone yet, drank wine and argued about the meaning of art. The owner of the establishment Freda - bearded, hairy, very kind - loved these madmen and often fed them on credit. The guys talked, Frede played the guitar, his wife Bertha cooked. The hall smelled of tobacco and food. Everyone was happy.
They loved to drink together, sing together, make fun of each other. So, in 1910, at the annual exhibition of the Society of Independent Artists ("Salon of the Independent"), Joachim Raphael Boronali's painting "Sunset on the Adriatic" appeared. The audience seriously discussed its merits and demerits. In fact, Sunset was written with the tail of a donkey that belonged to Freda. After a hearty dinner, Lolo the donkey waved its tail, which the jokers dipped in paints, and hit right on a specially placed canvas. The result was a picture that at the exhibition did not differ in any way from the real ones hanging nearby. The artists used this rally to discuss the pressing issue - what is a real avant-garde in art.
The time, place, atmosphere were unique. This does not repeat itself. But people come now to the Nimble Rabbit cabaret to at least imagine how it all was.
