City Lights

What do artists want? To live and work cheaply in a free-and-easy atmosphere. At the dawn of the 20th century Paris was the place for them. It was fun: it had cabarets, cafés, dance halls, bars, brothels, an underground railway, even neon lights. The artists gathered in steep and semi-rural Montmartre and later in Montparnasse, St. Germain des Près and the Latin Quarter. Groups of friends evolved into artistic movements, each with an "-ism" of its own. Even World War I couldn't cramp the city's style. "Paris, Capital of the Arts 1900-1968," which opened last month at London's Royal Academy...