Montparnasse

Montparnasse

Artist District/Cafe' Culture

Montparnasse is an area in the south of Paris, France, on the left bank of the river Seine, centered at the crossroads of the Boulevard du Montparnasse and the Rue de Rennes, between the Rue de Rennes and boulevard Raspail. Montparnasse has been part of Paris since 1669.
When all the artists left Montmartre at the beginning of World War I they didn’t migrate very far. In fact they just moved across the river to the district of Montparnasse.
This neighborhood occupies the 14th arrondissement, a part of the 15th and the southern end of the 6th. After World War I, Montparnasse became infamous as the artistic and intellectual center of Paris and had some gathered an astonishing number of artistic IQs: Picasso, Miro, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway and Jean-Paul Sartre were all living there.
Unfortunately much of Montparnasse was leveled in the 1960s to make way for a concrete train station and Paris's only - almost universally disliked - skyscraper, Tour Montparnasse.
Today Montparnasse is an important business district and has cleaned up its act somewhat from the penniless bohemian days.

Montparnasse – The Artist District

The world-famous Pablo Picasso was one of the first artists to leave Montmartre and settle in Montparnasse, and behind him followed a flood of intellectuals and artists like Cezanne, Jean-Paul Sartre, Giacometti, Dali or Ernest Hemingway. All this intellectual and artistic effervescence really contributed to the creative and libertarian atmosphere that characterized Montparnasse in the Roaring Twenties, which really consisted in the Golden Age of Montparnasse.
Montparnasse is called the artist world because so many artists (around the turn of the century) flocked to this area. The reason why they came at the close of LaCloserie des Lias is because there were wealthy people who hung out in the district. The wealthy people wanted to hear poetry and see artwork and they were very generous so the artist. The artist learned that if they could keep the attention of wealthy people, they could potential be sponsored. The main reason why artists lived in this particular area was because it was dirt cheap to live in and was literally a slum.
The artists lived in Montparnasse in the art district because it was inexpensive. The Cafés were very important to artist and writers in Paris because they were living in very poor conditions an in order to get things done; they had to go to a place with good lighting and heat to work.

(Note: Bullet point number two and three written above was stated by Monique Wells in the Entrée to Paris YouTube video)

Montparnasse - Café Culture

Due to café culture, Montparnasse became the artistic hub of the world during the inter-war period. From Picasso to Hemingway, the place to be for these revolutionary thinkers was the Café de la Rotonde. Here in this corner of Paris, ideas on life and death were transformed.
During the two World Wars, Montparnasse was a vibrant, exciting neighborhood that was constantly challenging the ideas and traditions of the time. Many painters, photographers, and intellects lived in Montparnasse due to the prominent café culture in the neighborhood that helped facilitate the flow of ideas. Expatriates, surrealists, and photographers spent entire days in the cafés of the area, leading to a strong interconnected community of artists and thinkers.
One of the most established cafés in the neighborhood was Café de la Rotonde. This particular café is so well-known because the famous customers and the new ideas on life that were created in la Rotonde.