Click on the photo to hear Annabel recount the first time she met Bernard. 

The slender brunette with a creative soul and the shy, prodigious painter with green-grey eyes were immediately drawn to each other. As if magnetised, they met several times over the summer and courted each other. One day, Bernard called Annabel and said:

‘Be in Marseille at four o’clock. It’s forever. Come with nothing. I want you without a past.’

The lovers boarded a schooner and sailed across the Mediterranean. From that moment on, they were inseparable. They married in December of the same year.

Annabel became Bernard's muse. The painter immortalised his wife in his works to express his love, particularly in 1960, when he painted Portraits of Annabel in her honour. Bernard Buffet did not limit himself to portraits. His work is filled with nods to Annabel, such as still lives depicting love letters or bouquets dedicated to his spouse.