Raoul Middleman had long been in love with French culture. He first became enamored with it while studying existentialist philosophy at Johns Hopkins, and later as a painter admiring the pantheon of French artists. On an early sabbatical from teaching, he moved to Paris where met his wife Ruth. However, when he went back in 1978, he wanted to live somewhere more rugged, that would satisfy his painterly ambitions. So he moved with his family for a year to the Ardèche, a remote mountainous region of France.