Stories
UN Declaration and Programme of Action for a Culture of Peace
Personalities in the "culture of peace bed"
When Lindsay came to live in Paris in 1995, she took advantage of the city as a graphic artist. We often visited museums together (she had said when we first met in 1980 that I passed the "museum test."). She enrolled in a class at the famous Ecole de Beaux Arts and I went to visit her one day as she say in a dark cold chapel making sketches of the paintings and sculptures that were barely visible in the darkened chapel. At one point she won a prize in an art show for her illustration of a scene from a book by Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
Her most important artistic endeavor were her coloring books. The first, and most successful was the coloring book of a little dog exploring the sites of Paris.
Lindsay's Paris Coloring Book
We invested $10,000 in the production and printing of the book and she distributed it to a wide range of sales points in Paris: the shops of the Eiffel Tower, the bookshops of the Louve and the Musee D'Orsay, the main English bookstore, and a range of small gift shops. The book sold briskly, especially at the museum bookshops where it was greatly admired. Lindsay tried to find a distributor, but was not successful after a long hunt.
When Lindsay was visiting her family in the States, it was my task to distribute the book to the bowels of the Louvre and the Musee D'Orsay and to a little gift shop on the street behind the Notre Dame Cathedral.
Lindsay went on to design a range of products based on the coloring book, including a book of games, postcards and a calendar. She later took a tour of the country to design a coloring book of the little dog visiting the carousels of France, including carousels in Marseilles and Toulouse.
Eventually she found the name of a publisher who had advertised with the American embassy and she signed a contract with him to produce and distribute the book. But month after month passed and he became more and more evasive. She hinted to me that he was looking for a sexual liaison with her instead. Finally, when it was clear that he would not fulfill the contractual agreement, Lindsay consulted an attorney who told her that if she were French she might win something in court, but as an American it was not worth the effort.
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Stages
1986-1992
Fall of Soviet Empire
1992-1997
UNESCO Culture of Peace Programme