My Village

What if you could send a reporter on a journey into the past... ? Imagine a subtle, inquisitive and shrewd investigator crossing time to blend into the backstreets of Auvers-sur-Oise in the 1890s. He would observe, question and record everything: the conversations between fishermen on the banks of the Oise river, the laughter at a wedding dinner, the bustle of a never-ending village fete. This is precisely what American painter and illustrator Elmer Boyd Smith has done, delivering an immersive record of stunning accuracy, in which every detail paints a vivid picture of local life... Across forty-eight chapters and nearly 150 drawings, he introduces us to his neighbors and to villagers such as the postman, the priest, and the hermit, while also taking an interest in passing visitors from the magician to itinerant tinkers each encounter offering an opportunity to share confidences and sketches. For the first time, the text is accompanied by over forty pages of notes that bring to light elements the author meticulously obscured to safeguard the anonymity of his witnesses among them the village of Auvers, recast as Valombre.