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November 24, 2017

After Hours: Napa Valley exhibit celebrates Julia Child

Photo by Paul Child
“France is a Feast: The Photographic Journey of Paul and Julia Child” features 60 rarely seen photographs, along with notebooks, logs, letters and Paul Child's Rolleiflex camera.

YOUNTVILLE, Calif. (AP) — Mention Julia Child and the image that comes to mind is a tall woman with a spoon in one hand, saying in a high voice, “Bon appetit!”

That was Child in her heyday as a 1960s TV show host teaching Americans the art of French cooking. But a new photo exhibit at California's Napa Valley Museum Yountville documents her life in France in the years before she hosted one of America's most popular TV cooking shows.

Child, a graduate of Smith College, worked during World War II for the agency that was the predecessor of the CIA. In 1946, she married Paul Child, who worked as a cultural attache at the U.S. embassy in Paris while his wife learned how to cook at the famed Le Cordon Bleu cooking school, subsequently studying with several famous chefs.

That period of her life was documented by Paul Child and is the subject of the show, “France is a Feast: The Photographic Journey of Paul and Julia Child.” The exhibit was inspired and shown in conjunction with the release of the book “France is a Feast” by Child's great-nephew, Alex Prud'homme, and Katie Pratt, a longtime friend of the Child's who also curated the exhibit.

The exhibit features 60 rarely seen black-and-white photographs taken between 1948 and 1954 along with notebooks, logs, letters and a Rolleiflex camera that Paul Child liked to use because it allowed him to look down and capture people unobtrusively.

Julia Child photo exhibit through Feb. 18 at Napa Valley Museum Yountville. Find out more at http://www.napavalleymuseum.org .



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