The Observatory, Saint-Michel-l'Observatoire (04)

Marcel de Kerolyr (1873-) began his working life as a violinist and married a singer whom he accompanied in Europe. They lived in Nice and he and his wife are said to have witnessed the accidental strangulation of Isidore Duncan in 1927. His wife lost her voice and, after subsisting on menial jobs, de Kerolyr visited the observatory in Nice and resolved to devote himself to astrophotography. He began in Digne, moved to Forcalquier, and probably died in 1969. Jean Giono's ‎Le Poids du ciel (1938) contains thirty-two astrophotographs made by Kerolyr.‎ (He also joined in with Giono's Contadour 'utopia').