Nice PS

One of the most surprising things about Nice was that the city of Matisse and Dufy seems now to be entirely devoted to Bad Art, both upmarket and down - I haven't seen so much hideous tat (expensive as well as cheap) since my last stay in Honfleur. There are the museums and galleries of course - including, out of town, the Matisse Museum - but outside their walls, virtually no trace of the two artists. No reproductions or posters to be seen, not so much as a postcard even. In the light of the massive popularity of the cut-outs, you'd have thought that Nice would be branding itself as a themed city, Matisseville-sur-Mer - but no, far from it. And as for the city's (recent) Public Art, it could scarcely be worse - mostly a matter of gigantic steel girders incongruously placed, as if Nice were some decayed industrial town rather than the jewel of the Cote d'Azur. All very odd.