Leaning Tower — Of Paris — Appears At Marjolaine

Arlene Cardenas’s dream has come true: The Eiffel Tower can now be found in her quaint French-style pastry shop.

More precisely, a mural of the tower is now up on the wall of Cardenas’s Upper State Street bakery, Marjolaine. A reception took place in the shop last week to unveil the mural, which was painted by New Haven’s Kwadwo Adae.

Colorful images of El Morro, the historic fortress of her native Puerto Rico, are also proudly displayed in her State Street pastry shop but Cardenas is beaming about the new mural, a perfect complement to the flaky croissants she bakes for customers each day.

Cardenas, 33, said she started working at the pastry shop when she was 14. She purchased the business from Rusty Hamilton, the previous owner, when she was 28. When she was young, a friend handed her a pink Eiffel Tower souvenir. She came to love the symbol and wanted to have a painting of the tower to go with the shop’s walls, which she had painted a welcoming pink. Cardenas said she connected with Adae through a mutual friend.

Adae’s mural was ten months in the making. His quest to capture ​“the essence of Paris” led to an extended period of self-directed French language immersion before traveling with his sister to see and experience the city and its iconic tower in person. ​“The drive to learn was important because every single time that I paint in public, people come up and talk to you,” Adae said. ​“I knew Paris would be no different, so it was imperative to learn the language.”

Much like the work of Grant Wood, America’s 20th century master of rolling fields and undulating Midwest farmland, Adae’s stylized mural, Jour Ensoleillé Sous La Tour Eiffel (A sunny day under the Eiffel Tower), is brimming with activity and animated movement: a river, walkways, trees, a petit pont, and the Eiffel Tower itself seem to be dancing with joie de vivre. ​“I like playing with hyperbolic geometry — no ninety degree angles,” Adae said. ​“Everything is based on arches.”

Adae’s colorful characters are as exuberant as the painting’s Parisian landscape elements. Absent are natural human flesh tones. Adae said he has been using expressive color abstraction for his figural depictions for around ten years. By imbuing characters with bright, imaginative coloration (that some may associate with cartoon animation), the figures take on a universality that people can identify with, according to Adae. The artist also takes license with facial features, capturing the overall vitality of figures with gesture rather than illustrating every physical detail. Some of the characters have been depicted in previous murals.

“I love the people,” noted Hamilton. ​“The romantic part, the tourist part, and the artist part — they’re all in there.” Cardenas said people ​“find themselves in the painting,” identifying a strolling couple with several frolicking children as her own family.

The Marjolaine mural is Adae’s second in New Haven this year, after Flapper’s Delight (The Blue Ladies), installed in The 9th Note on 85 Orange Street. Other public art pieces include a mural in the music room of the Children’s Museum, a painting titled Sunday hanging at the Mitchell Branch Library in Westville, and a painting hanging inside Louis Lunch on Crown Street. 

Adae founded the Adae Fine Art Academy in 2005, an alternative drawing and painting school located in the Ninth Square at 817 Chapel St., where he teaches drawing and painting to aspiring artists of all skill levels and ages. The winter session at the Adae Fine Art Academy runs from January 5th through February 28th.

Artist Liz Antle‑O’Donnell, who was among New Haven’s cultural hipsters at the unveiling Thursday, said that while she enjoyed seeing photos of the mural, seeing it in person was much more impressive. ​“It makes me happy,” she said smiling, expressing what was, without question, the crowd consensus.