Many stars and artists came to Port Grimaud. Some bought a house for a few years, like Robert DHERY, Jacques CHARRIER, Henry TROYAT, Paul Emile VICTOR, Prince NAPOLEON, Peter SELLERS, Charles ASNAVOUR, Joan COLLIN, Luc FERRY or René MONORY...

Sets for TV shows, films or series :

      One of the first to visit Port Grimaud was
Brigitte BARDOT...
      She took advantage of the shooting of JC Averty's show "le Brigitte Bardot shows" where she had to sing on a boat entering Port Grimaud and in the Grand'Rue, to meet Monsieur SPOERRY...

      In 1985, Louis REGO shot "Poulets-frites" (an ignominious turnip unfortunately) on the beach and the market place...

      In 1992, a TV movie which had a lot of audience "Les coeurs brulés" with Mireille DARC was shot, in part, in the lake city...

      The French television soap opera "Sous le soleil" created by Olivier Brémond and Pascal Breton, was broadcast between 13 March 1996 and 20 December 2008 on TF1. This soap opera was filmed for the most part in Saint Tropez and its region and in PORT GRIMAUD.
      The actors were housed in a residence in Port Grimaud whose rooms, according to Frédéric Deban, an actor in the series (Grégory), were rather cramped. They were all a bit surprised, as they were shooting in luxurious places...

"The gendarme gets married" :

In July 68, Jean Girault shot a scene from "Gendarme gets married" with Louis de FUNES and Michel GALABRU, place des 6 canons...       The shooting of this film was marked by a long strike triggered by the events of "May 68";       It was also mourned by the death of a stuntman, in front of the gendarmerie of St Tropez.       For the record: It was because of a real-life misadventure that happened to Richard Balducci, that the latter imagined a comedy set in the gendarmerie of Saint Tropez. The script was written by Richard Balducci, Jacques Vilfrid and Jean Girault.       Coming from Saint Tropez while scouting for a film, and having stopped in GRIMAUD to admire the panorama, Richard Balducci, director and scriptwriter, had his camera stolen from his car. Very upset, he rushes to the nearest gendarmerie in Saint-Tropez to report the theft and lodge a complaint. There, a rather indolent gendarme, who finds it hard to be bothered by this angry tourist who turns up at the sacred hour of lunch, tells him: "But it's not all that serious!" and tells him that the thief is known but that the gendarmes missed him a few days earlier and that there is nothing they can do about it now.       Very upset by the nonchalance of this civil servant, Richard Balducci left the Gendarmerie, saying "I'm going to write something about you, because I've never seen that in my life! And this is how the great adventure of Le Gendarme de Saint Tropez began to germinate and to be written...

Exhibition of MENDJISKY :

The first exhibition in Port Grimaud, MENDJISKY's works (paintings and sculptures) took place on August 13, 1970 in the brand new hall of the Maison Commune (see the page dedicated to Serge MENDJISKY)

Original exhibition by ZAROU :

At the same time, a very original exhibition took place on the water! That of the artist ZAROU (born in GASSIN in 1930) who fixed all his paintings on small rafts placed here and there, between the Chaussette and the Maison Commune.       To see the paintings, you had to pilot a boat or be a good swimmer! (photo Afp photo presse)       Zarou passed away on 20 November 2013 in Saint-Antonin du Var...

Various :

      In the spring of 1970, filming of the TV film "Bel ami", based on the work of Maupassant (photo opposite)

      On July 8, 1970, a YOUTH CLUB was created in Port Grimaud: a room in the Place du Marché was made available to them. The first event of the club was a costume party.

      In July 1969, Jean Christophe AVERTY filmed Charles AZNAVOUR singing 'Que c'est triste Venise' in the few canals of PORT GRIMAUD, for his programme 'Formi Formidable' broadcast for the end of the year celebrations on the 'second colour channel' of the time!...

      And surely nobody at the time saw the ... deception'!




      In the spring of 1977, Alain SOUCHON and Laurent VOULZY retreated for several weeks to a flat in the Place des Artisans to compose the album "Allo Maman Bobo"...

Coin Coin :

At that time, a real 'local star', a strange character, Coin Coin, was clowning around on a one-wheeled bicycle in front of Sénéquier's and on the port of Saint Tropez, to the great joy of tourists and residents.       Escaping for a few hours from his privileged domain, Coin Coin came to Port Grimaud where, for a very good and long time, he was able to do his 'show', totally improvised, in the middle of a pleasantly surprised and delighted crowd...

'Les Biches' :

      In the film "Les Biches" by Claude CHABROL, Jean Louis TRINTIGNANT played the role of an architect who was building a lake city, a character directly inspired by François SPOERRY. Some scenes of the film were shot in Port Grimaud...

André QUELLIER :

André QUELLIER, who died in 2010, was a painter who exhibited every year, first at the Chapelle des Pénitents in Ramatuelle and then, from 1982, at the Atelier du Ciel. He also participated every year in the 'Salon des Peintres de Saint Tropez'...       The posters for his exhibitions very often featured a painting by the author representing Brigitte BARDOT. But for the 1991 exhibition, the poster featured a painting dedicated to the architect of Port Grimaud, François SPOERRY.       On this rather strange poster one could see the effigy of the architect and an aerial view of the lake city with this dedication: 'Hommage à PORT GRIMAUD et à son Architecte'.       Detail of the poster :

Martine ALISON :

« My world is full of dreams bordering on the naive, which leads me to a delicate sensuality» : This is how Martine ALISON defines her inspiration. Her paintings sparkle with colour and happiness. Flowers mingle with animals, cartoon characters, in the middle of which a pretty young girl walks, draws, contemplates the landscape, rests, hitchhikes or seems to pose in front of the painter...         Born in 59 in Saint Etienne, she is very passionate about drawing and has a wealth of inspiration that is quickly found on these colourful canvases, and bubbling with life...         « My painting is a technique developed through hard work, it is the expression of a whole life. It is necessary to have lived, to have accumulated experiences, to have stored images, to have discovered freedom, to have met happiness and to have accepted to say… to say with his brush… at the rhythm of beauty, the rhythm of his emotions. There is no secret, there is only authenticity, you don't have to search. You must BE… BE without reserve, without constraint. It is life that has sculpted me in this way, I don't invent anything, I execute. I observe and become aware of the abundance of life that surrounds me and I draw inspiration from it to create a work in the same vein, that is to say, an act of an almost theatrical nature where the imagination can propel the stage. »... On peut la retrouver sur: son site internet ou sur son son Instagram. His paintings can be seen and purchased on : le Singulart or on the website Artmajeur

    Quelques oeuvres... :

Vartan BERBERIAN :

      Born in Gardanne, France, 80 years ago, to Armenian parents who survived the genocide of 1915. He considers that he has three homelands: France, Armenia and the Navy. He lives in Paris but has been a resident of PORT GRIMAUD for many years.

The book :

      A colourful portrait of a discreet, hard-working, supportive and warm community, these memoirs are the author's tribute to his own.

      To his mother, first of all, Mayrig, a woman with a big heart, a small figure dressed all in black, animated by a gentleness and an unparalleled energy, who knew how to inculcate in him the sense of effort and the value of work.

      To his father, too, Hayrig, who, having experienced the horror of Turkish jails, has nonetheless retained his joie de vivre and his capacity for wonder. A biblical character straight out of an oriental tale, brimming with wisdom, this father crosses the book with a lucid and tender look at his family, commenting on the habits and customs of this strange land of plenty: France.

      A true "apprenticeship novel", this story also follows the path of the young Vartan, noticed by his teachers at school, and retraces his extracurricular initiatives to earn money and help his parents, the humiliations he may have suffered because of his origins or his poverty, his training in the navy, and then his success as an inventor&hellip

      A beautiful lesson in optimism and a mine of information on a not so distant era.





Easy to read, fascinating, sometimes frightening, often optimistic and indispensable for understanding the challenges of artificial intelligence.












- Postcard from "Editions Archives": "PASSION...PETANQUE" - The comic strip -

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the work of François SPOERRY...

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