Some may argue that it has been a long time coming, but at last the elegant town of Menton, located between Monaco and the Italian Riviera, is celebrating Menton’s long and rich love affair with the painter, poet, filmmaker and dramatist Jean Cocteau, with the opening of the Jean Cocteau Museum.

Menton’s association with Cocteau dates back to the 1950s, when the multi-talented artist was commissioned by the city of Menton to create various pieces of art, including the Salles des Mariages in the city hall. In gratitude of the splendid work Cocteau carried out in the city, Menton adopted the artist as an honorary citizen.

It was during this time that Jean Cocteau transformed a small and abandoned fort in Menton into a museum for his personal artwork, where he hung his own paintings, tapestries and mosaics.

On November 6, 2011, Menton opened its doors to its own Jean Cocteau Museum, located in Menton’s Old Town in a building, so striking in its aesthetical merits that it does Cocteau’s artwork the justice it deserves.

Until May 7, 2012, the Severin Wunderman Collection will be held at the Cocteau Museum. The collection has been gathered by Severin Wunderman, a well-known art lover and former owner of the Swiss luxury watch brand Corum.

The exhibition consists of more than 2,000 artworks, including ceramics, books, paintings, tapestries, drawings, manuscripts, prints and jewellery made by Cocteau himself. A handful of artworks created by fellow artists, including Modigliani, Picasso and Di Chirico, are also on display at the exhibition.

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Saint-Paul-de-Vence, situated approximately 25 kilometres from Nice, is one of the oldest medieval towns on the Cote d’Azur. Having long been a haven for the rich and famous, in the 1960s this ancient town saw many a French actor being drawn to its unusual eccentricities, including Simone Signoret, Lino Ventura and Yves Montland.

Alongside famous actors, some of the world’s most celebrated artists have lived in Saint-Paul-de-Vence, such as Marc Chagnall, and, more recently, artist lovers Arielle Dombasle and Bernard Henri Levy.

Being a well-known hive for attracting famous actors, poets and artists, it seems only natural that Saint-Paul-de-Vence is equally as renowned for its modern and contemporary art museums and galleries, the most famous being La Fondation Maeght, one of the most esteemed galleries in the south of France.

The Fondation Maeght was founded in 1964 by Marguerite and Aime Maeght, a French art collector and editor. The extensive collection housed at the Fondation Maeght includes works by some of the most important and influential artists of the 20^th century, including Joan Miro, Fernand Leger, Georges Braque and Alexander Calder.

This independently funded gallery, which relies on no state funding whatsoever, attracts more than 200,000 visitors each year and many of the art exhibitions that are put on every year in museums throughout France, in Europe and beyond, are based on Fondation Maeght collections.

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She has been dubbed as being a ‘master of photography,’ creating dreamy fashion photographs that are ‘almost like a painter’s’. She is known as a ‘legend in her own lifetime’ and one who unites all the clichés of modern photography. Who are we talking about?

The French photographer Sarah Moon of course, who, according to The Independent, has “the power to bewitch”.

For such a ‘bewitching’ photographer, who, for more than 35 years, has created some of the most ‘heart-stoppingly beautiful fashion imagery’, there could not be quite as a bewitching location than the Cote d’Azur to complement her alluring fashion photography and do her images the justice they deserve.

Until 12 February 2012, those fortunate to be on the Cote d’Azur will have the chance to see the international photography legend’s work at an exhibition in Nice, titled ‘1 2 3 4 5’.

130 pieces of her artwork, ranging from 1986 – 2000 will be on display at the exhibition, which, according to Sarah Moon, is aimed at inviting the public into her ‘personal universe’, in a ‘dream world from reality, where the evanescence of beauty, time and uncertainty are recurrent themes.’

The award-winning photographer, who started her career as a model, as had her work published in the top fashion magazines, including Vogue, Chanel, Comme des Garcons, Harper’s Bazaar, Nova and Cacharel.

Her photographs, the artist admits, have been inspired by many facets of life, including her friends, family, the landscape, personal feelings, nature, and, of course, fashion.

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The Cote d’Azur may have become renowned for being a popular spot for aristocrats to muse the days away, but when the legendary rock n roller’s The Rolling Stones found refuge here in the summer of 1971, the region was catapulted into a sanctuary for legendary yet somewhat anguished stars.

Exactly 40 years ago, The Rolling Stones, battling with drug addiction, constant harassment by the British authorities and financial problems, went into exile in the South of France.

The troubled rock band spent the summer at Villa Nellcote, a sixteen-room mansion on the waterfront of Villefranche-Sur-Meron on the Cote d’Azur. It was during their time at Villa Nellcote, that the group recorded sessions in the basement of the villa, for their classic 1972 album ‘Exile on Main Street’.

The Rolling Stones are reported to have been inspired immensely by their temporary residence on the Cote d’Azur. Their stay at Villa Nellcote, granted reciprocal notoriety for both the Stones and the venue itself, the former for producing arguably their most celebrated and storied album, and the latter for becoming a practically world-known venue almost overnight.

Villa Nellcote was built in the late 1890s by Eugene Thomas, a former banker. The villa was built imposingly, decorated elaborately framed by iconic columns made from marble. In 1919, the “Amicitia Castle” as it had become known, was rechristened as “Nellcote”.

This almost baroque house on the Cote d’Azur provided the perfect solution for the band to avoid having to pay 93% income tax if they had stayed in the UK. The ingenious solution was thought up by the Rolling Stone’s financial advisor, Prince Rupert Lowenstein.

But asides from being a pragmatic ‘business’ reason that saw the Stones say ‘goodbye’ to London and ‘bonjour’ to the south of France, the British rock band had a relaxing, peaceful and stunningly beautiful spot to write and record what was arguably their most legendary album.

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Diane Arbus was one of the most influential, bold and controversial artists of the twentieth century, whose astonishing photography has been said to have ‘revolutionised the medium”.

Born in New York in 1923, Arbus became notorious for her black and white square photographs of “deviant and marginal people”, including giants, dwarfs, nudists, circus performers and transvestites.

In 1971, the American photographer and writer committed suicide. Since her death, Arbus’s work has been exhibited at galleries and museums across the world, and she was the first American photographer to have her photographs displayed at the Venice Biennale.

Despite some of her photographs selling for hundreds of thousands of dollars in auctions, Arbus still provokes controversy, with the likes of Norman Mailer saying in 1971, “Giving a camera to Diane Arbus is like putting a live grenade in the hands of children.”

In October this year, a new book about the controversial late artist will go on sale. Titled ‘Diane Arbus: A Chronology’, the book reads like a contemporaneous diary and includes unpublished writings and private thoughts and motivations, drawn primarily from Arbus’s extensive correspondence with family, friends and colleagues, ranging from Lisette Model, August Sander, Weegee and Marvin Israel.

Coinciding with the launch of Diane Arbus: A Chronology, is an international travelling exhibition, which will premiere at the Jeu de Paume in Paris from October 18, 2011 until February 5, 2011.

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