Paul Gauguin and André Breton: hotel plaques

Paul Gauguin, André Breton, and Maurice Le Scouezec are just three famous celebrities who stayed in the Hotel Delambre in Paris. People know this by the three gold plaques, not on the façade, but in the entranceway hidden from view.

Paul Gauguin (1848-1903) was a French Post-Impressionist artist, noted mostly for his colourful paintings that he created during the ten years he lived in Tahiti in French Polynesia (1891-1893 and 1895-1903). The gold plaque at the Hotel Delambre reads: “In this hotel came, in 1891, the artist painter Paul Gauguin.”

Maurice Le Scouezec (1881-1940) was a French artist, engraver, illustrator, writer, soldier, sailor, and voyager. He worked with painters such as Pablo Picasso and Amedeo Modigliani. Le Scouezec is noted mostly for his paintings from his African visits. The gold plaque at the Hotel Delambre reads: “The painter and writer Maurice Le Scouezec 1881-1940 lived in this hotel from 1917 to 1924.”

André Breton (1896-1966) was a Surrealist French writer and poet. He was noted for his 1924 book called Surrealist Manifesto. The gold plaque at the Hotel Delambre reads: “In this hotel came in 1921 writer André Breton.”

MARTINA NICOLLS

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MARTINA NICOLLS is an international aid and development consultant, and the author of: The Paris Residences of James Joyce (2020), Similar But Different in the Animal Kingdom (2017), The Shortness of Life: A Mongolian Lament (2015), Liberia’s Deadest Ends (2012), Bardot’s Comet (2011), Kashmir on a Knife-Edge (2010) and The Sudan Curse (2009).

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