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Architects such as Tadao Ando, Jean Nouvel, Renzo Piano and Jean-Michel Wilmotte have given free rein to their talent by designing the various buildings that house guestrooms, restaurants, cellars and exhibition centres. Built on a former vineyard, the Art Centre designed by Tadao Ando, with its row of columns that extend outwards from the interior of the architecture to lose themselves in the middle of the vines, symbolises Château La Coste’s mission to link high-brow artistic culture with the more telluric cultivation of the terroir.

JEAN NOUVEL, Richard haughton

The Commandery of Peyrassol

The Commanderie de Peyrassol, for its part, came into being following its acquisition by Philippe Austruy in 2001, who was intent on transforming it into a place dedicated to the production of excellent wines and to contemporary artistic creation. Today, it boasts around a hundred works in this Provencal setting, the fruit of the encounter between artists and the surrounding countryside. The owner’s collection of twentieth- and twenty-first-century art offers a totally immersive experience. The collection includes major names such as Frank Stella, Sol LeWitt, Niki de Saint Phalle and Jean Dubuffet, as well as works by contemporary artists of the likes of Daniel Buren, Bernar Venet and Joana Vasconcelos, created especially for the estate.

You will be taken on guided tours of the cellars and the art collection, be invited to taste creative cuisine at Chez Jeannette, where the menu is inspired by local produce, and set down your luggage at La Rouvière, a guest house where you can take the time to share your impressions with travellers on a quest to make new and exciting discoveries. Throughout the year, the Commanderie de Peyrassol puts on a calendar of exhibitions, walks and “Sunset” evenings in July and August. Concerts are accompanied by wine tastings, and harvest day is an immersive event. The whole experience is further enhanced by the knowledge and professionalism of a talented team who will be your chaperons on this journey into an enchanted world.

Victor Vasarely, Sculpture P&T, 1978, Courstesy Victor Vasarely and Peyrassol. C. Goussard

Foundation CAB Saint-Paul de Vence

In Saint-Paul-de-Vence, apart from the must-see Maeght Foundation, a major centre dedicated to twentieth-century art, which owes its existence to a couple of visionary art dealers, Marguerite and Aimé Maeght, we set our sights on the CAB Saint-Paul-de-Vence Foundation, which is housed in a sublime building dating from the 1950s. It hosts exhibition rooms, a restaurant, a bookshop and boutique, as well as 4 guest rooms, each with its own distinctive personality, and a dismantled house by Jean Prouvé, all completely renovated by Charles Zana, a French architect and interior designer.

FONDATION CAB Saint-Paul de Vence, Room

EDITH DEKYNDT

The project is the brainchild of Hubert Bonnet. This Belgian collector is perpetuating the work of the CAB Brussels Foundation, which resolutely champions minimal and conceptual art. Driven by the ambition of becoming a major player on the region’s modern and contemporary art circuit, the Foundation pursues a twofold aim. While showcasing the Foundation’s collection and putting on thematic exhibitions that turn the heat up even higher in the summer season, it also serves as a trailblazing centre for artists in residence. Emerging and established painters and sculptors spend a few months here, working, researching and reflecting on their practice, without the pressure of production or presentation.

These artists sign up to the CAB Foundation’s mission of interpreting and questioning the traditions of minimalism and conceptualism with their own contemporary take. Until the end of October 2024, Belgian artist Édith Dekyndt will be creating site-specific works in the Foundation’s 2 upper spaces, in dialogue with a range of works from the collection. Her creations offer sensory experiences based on the meticulous observation of matter and the cultural contexts that encompass it. Processual and conceptual in nature, her approach focuses on the often ordinary objects that make up everyday life, and how they are transformed by contact with natural and architectural environments.

EDITH DEKYNDT, Specific subjects, Fondation CAB Saint-Paul-de-Vence, 2024. Edith Dekyndt

Venet Foundation

Pressing on with our itinerary, we are drawn almost naturally to push open the gates of the Venet Foundation in Le Muy. Created in 2014, this place is the culmination of more than sixty years of creative endeavours, in constant evolution, spread over more than seven hectares.

The property is dotted with sculptures by the artist, who even surprises us with an impromptu meeting. We fall under the charm of this charismatic figure who exudes such extraordinary simplicity and kindness, and discover him also as a collector of many works of minimal and conceptual art, including works by Tony Cragg, Richard Long and James Turrell.

Visits are organised from spring onwards by appointment only. This exclusivity gives you the feeling of being alone in the world, a privilege that adds an extra dimension to your discovery of this art Mecca. If ever there was a place to put on your bucket list, then this is it!

Anish Kapoor, Intersection, 2012, Corten steel 515 x 845,5 x 514,4 cm. Jerome Cavaliere