Why are we attracted to water so that at the slightest opportunity we want to jump into it? Because the pleasure of water is innate in humans, who by bathing immerse themselves in their origins. And if today, the sea and its beaches particularly attract to enjoy the pleasures of water, we have forgotten that before being salty the water of our first nautical leisure activities was fresh. The exhibition is organized by the Musée de la Batellerie de Conflans-Sainte-Honorine which once again goes beyond its walls to offer you the opportunity to discover its riches: Among the almost two hundred pieces exhibited you will be able to see very abundant illustrations, engravings in particular by Daumier, photographs, drawings, caricatures and even entrance tickets for floating baths, the ancestors of our swimming pools. Through this exhibition, we learn that rivers, in the last century and up until the 1950s, were the privileged space where entire generations learned to swim, fish, canoe and do water sports. At the beginning of the century, people went to the river beaches around Paris, as they do today in Deauville. Having your canoe, rowing your boat, swimming, fishing in open water, having lunch on the grass, drinking and dancing in the guinguettes, that was it, Sundays in the countryside a stone’s throw from Paris. It is also thanks to rivers that men had a nautical education and that they were able to invent increasingly sophisticated technical means, from fishing to water sports, including canoeing, always with the aim of increasing their pleasure on the water and their sensations. Temporary exhibition at the orangery of the priory park labeled by Paris 2024 “Cultural Olympiad”. Frédéric Delaive, scientific curator of the exhibition.
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