More museums

Posted 8/2/2014

I visited many museums while in Paris, and some of them I've already covered.  I thought I'd talk about some of the others here.

As for the biggies:  I went to the Louvre with my younger sister, Ellen, who had not visited Paris before.  Several weeks earlier, in one of my French conversation groups, a Parisian woman had advised me, "Pour eviter des foules, allez le soir" (To avoid crowds, go in the evening).  She spoke the truth.  The Louvre is open late on Wednesdays (and on Fridays, I believe).  I also had a tip from my guidebook as to avoiding long ticket lines.  So, we had a light dinner at a little cafe not too far from the museum, then headed to the mall under the Louvre and found the tabac (ostensibly a tobacco shop, but they sell all kinds of things, e.g. Metro and RER tickets, postage stamps, etc.-- the one around the corner from my apartment was also very handy).  There were actually signs pointing there to buy museum passes, but nothing about individual tickets.  We bought two tickets with no waiting, and Ellen had a nice conversation in French with the salesperson, who said he would prefer the dry weather in Albuquerque (her home) to the rainy weather we were having in Paris.  Tickets in hand, we then went upstairs and just walked in!  Hoorah!  We had the usual problems navigating that huge place, but getting in was really a breeze.  We saw pretty much all of the crowd-pleasers (Mona Lisa, Venus de Milo, etc.), as well as Napoleon III's apartment, and most of the Dutch paintings, which Ellen particularly enjoys.  I didn't take many photos this time, though.  (I had been once before, in 2010.)

Update:  That's a lot of text with no photos, so I will add a few from my previous trip (in 2010).

Here is the Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel, just outside of the museum.  (This may have been my first Paris photo!)


Unfortunately, Winged Victory was not in place when Ellen and I were there:



But the goddess Athena was, with her wonderful marble gown:


and this cute little owl in her hand:


and, as noted above, we did see the Venus de Milo:


and these famous hands.



I went to the d'Orsay with both of my sisters (Ellen and Susan).  The policy there is no photos, not even of the building (meaning the interior, of course).  The stated purpose is to avoid gridlock, i.e. at "photo op" spots.  The building (a converted train station) is very striking, so it's tempting.  Naturally, people were taking photos anyway, but not that many.  Perhaps if it gets out of hand, they'll start enforcing the policy.  In any case, it's a don't-miss museum, especially if you like the impressionists.

I also visited the Orangerie, on the other side of the river, which has another fine collection of impressionists.  It has the same no-photo policy for the large Monet water lily paintings, but not for the rest of the museum.

Update:  Here are some of the many interesting paintings at the Orangerie.  I always like Cezanne:


The presence of the airplane in this painting by Rousseau (dated around 1908) is striking to say the least!  I did a bit of research and found that he did occasionally include images of "modern technology" in his paintings where they appeared very out of place (Portrait de M. X. [Pierre Loti], 1910; Vue de Malakoff, 1908).  After looking at those two (which include smokestacks and power poles, respectively), I still find this one the most incongruous.


There were several paintings by the abstract expressionist Chaim Soutine.  I thought the image below was pretty wild, in the context of this museum's collection, but I later learned that Soutine's most famous series of paintings represent a beef carcass.  So I guess this one is tame in comparison.



I visited the Cluny (official name:  Musée National du Moyen-Age – Thermes de Cluny), one of the most underrated museums in Paris (selon moi), three times! -- with Ellen, with my friend Marilynd, and with my sisters.  It was just about a 10-minute walk from the apartment, and it was also a good place to buy museum passes, since the lines are usually not long (as I said, underrated).  The only real crowds to contend with were usually groups of kids going through on school trips.

Its best known works are the "Lady and the Unicorn" tapestries:



This is just a small sampling-- there are six large tapestries.  The first photo shows one of them, and I took that photo in 2010.  The second shows a detail of my favorite animal motif, what I call the concerned bunny.  There is at least one concerned bunny in each tapestry.  After my 2010 trip, I took selections from my photos to form this concerned-bunny triptych:  [or maybe s/he's whispering secrets?]


On this trip, I found a concerned-bunny notepad in the gift shop, so others have appreciated this motif too, apparently.

Another tapestry in the museum featured, in addition to another unicorn, the marvelous porcupine to its left:
(This series of tapestries told the story of a saint's life, but I clearly wasn't too interested in him...)



Another featured a cat, so naturally it must be included!  Actually, it's very cute; a woman is weaving (or spinning?), and the cat is (of course) playing with the yarn:


Kitty's a little hard to see, so I will help you out with that:



Another all-time favorite of me and Ellen (my partner) is this statue of the holy family.  We find it hilarious.  Mary needs a break from baby care, so she takes her book and says "you go play with him now"... and Jesus attempts to pull off his long-suffering father's head.  Or so it appears:


And this madonna is standing exactly how any woman stands when she's balancing her kid on her hip:


So, we found some of this medieval art to be surprisingly modern.

The Cluny is built on the site of Roman baths, dating to about 200 A.D.  Here is my friend Marilynd photographing the "frigidarium".  (The short pillars to the left supports blocks from the oldest known man-made structures in Paris, columns dating to around 25 A.D.)



You can also see, in a room nearby, the original heads of the "kings of Judah" from Notre-Dame cathedral, which were knocked off by the revolutionaries, who took them to be kings of the royal variety.  They were found in 1977 during a construction project near the Opera Garnier.

And you can see the horn from a narwhal.  (I think there is a tie-in to the unicorns there, as well as to an exhibit of bone and ivory carvings.)  It is surprisingly long.  Yes, the Cluny is full of surprises!  You should go!

More museums in the next post...





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