Art Galleries Part 2

  So our week in Paris was drawing to a close. We had completed our preplanned agenda, soaked in atmosphere, shopped for souvenirs, but lo and behold we still had one more free day. Never one to waste a day in a foreign city, I reverted back to an idea that Joani and I had already discussed before we ever left Canada. Another Art gallery. Wow, I bet anyone reading this is surprised! How many art galleries in how many days?

 Rodin works more in sculpture than paint and given a preference I will admit that I enjoy paintings more. But we now had some extra time so why not? In hindsight I will freely admit that the Musee Rodin turned out to be a very pleasant surprise with an outdoor section of sculptures surrounded by a beautiful garden and a large indoor collection which contained a hidden Van Gogh masterpiece. (Can't go wrong). All in all this was a very lovely way to spend an extra day in Paris.

I enjoy all art, but sculptures do not evoke the same emotions for me as paintings, so I will just show you what I feel is Rodin's best works and let you draw your own opinions. 

Rodin was an admirer of Van Gogh and regarded him as  “an admirable demolisher of academic formulae, [who] also had a genius for light,” (Rodin, 1909). I of course have to include The Van Gogh gem he had in his collection.

Portrait Of Pere Tanguy

As I already stated, I thoroughly enjoyed our time at the Musee Rodin. It was a fine way to close out our time in Paris.

I will show you a few more sculptures we saw in our travels around Paris.

The Ghost Of Christmas present?

Joani's new friend.

Wish I could walk through walls.

 So as I had mentioned we also visited one other Art gallery which I didn't include photos of. This was mainly because.. well I'll let Wikipedia say this for me.

"The museum is most famous as the permanent home of eight large Water Lilies murals by Claude Monet, 

The Water Lillies donation to the Orangerie was finalized in 1922.

 Originally, the museum was inaugurated on 17 May 1927 as the Musée Claude Monet,

and formally renamed the Musée National de l’Orangerie des Tuileries."

.

Monet donated these paintings to celebrate peace after WW 1, and specified that he wanted the display rooms to be designated as quiet meditation spaces.

In seven days we saw a ton of art and architecture.  The image of these two rooms seemed the perfect way to wrap up this vacation post.

Peace out!  

Garry and Joan

Montmarte

  Montmartre was a must see for us the first time we visited France and of course we wanted to revisit it. Almost every time we have been in Europe we have visited a winery, so should this time be any different? Turns out one of the last remaining wineries in central Paris  Le Clos Montmartre, is hidden within the tangle of streets that comprise this hilltop in Paris. We could combine our love for this district of Paris with our love of viniculture in one long fun day. So climb a flight of stairs with us and enjoy Montmartre.

So I was not kidding when I said that this winery was located in the heart of Paris.

Growing both grapes.

And vegetables in amongst apartment buildings.

The leaf covered hut on the right side is where we did our...

Wine tasting.

Afterward we visited the wineries very own in house Art gallery, which had some very cool items.

Yes, that is a cat on her shoulder.

God, I love cats.

Lapin Agile

(The Agile Bunny)

Have you ever made shadow animals?  Again, I find this so cool.

These are 3 dimensional carvings framed under glass.

Joani had told me when she booked this wine tour that it contained a small art gallery and admission would be included, I just didn't realize how cool this Gallery would be. It was a hidden gem. As I've said before.. Joani never fails to find the hidden gems of our trips.

 When we left the winery we spent the rest of the day souvenir shopping and having savoury crepes. It was a marvelous day in Montmartre.

Top of the world.

Garry

Two Cemeteries and One Tomb

 

So you tell people you're going to spend a week in Paris and they say ," wow, that's cool". Then they say "what are you going to do in Paris?" and you tell them you're going to visit two cemeteries and they look at you quite strangely!

 So guess what Joani and I have been up to the last few days. Going to a couple of cemeteries!

 Are we cool or what? Before you think "or what" let me explain. 

The Cimetière du Père-Lachaise  is a bona fide tourist spot that contains the remains of such luminaries as the famed musician Frederic Chopin, Rockstar Jim Morrison, painter George Seurat, Edith Piaf, Oscar Wilde, Marcel Proust and a host of other famous people. So that was one of the cemeteries we visited and we placed flowers on some of the graves that were more meaningful to us, to pay tribute.

Chopin

Jim Morrison

Edith Piaf

Definitely a cool moment!

We visited several other graves including George Seurat's which was cool but a very low key family site.

Couldn't  find Modigliani, which was disappointing and avoided Oscar Wilde. ( If you've read "the Portrait Of Dorian Grey" ) You'll perhaps understand why.

All in all creepy ,

But cool!

The second cemetery we visited was in Auvers sur Oise, where Vincent Van Gogh was buried.  You'll understand why we wanted to go there. I took a sunflower, (Vincent's favourite flower) to pay tribute, said hello, introduced him to Joani and told him how much his art was loved in the world today. It was a very emotional visit. Joani talked about how she could feel him walking around the town with his paints, easel and canvas strapped to his back and I also could feel his presence.

For any one who has made a religious pilgrimage or visited Graceland, I'm sure you can understand what this moment meant to me. It's probably a good thing I have sunglasses on!

The town where this cemetery is housed now seems to have an economy built around his gravesite which is funny being as how people really didn't like him when he was alive.

Two Photos of the actual Church in the painting that I already mentioned was featured in a Dr Who episode.

The Poster below is of one of his last paintings before he died. "Wheatfield with Crows." and I'm standing  where Vincent would have stood when he painted this. 

Another emotional moment!

Traveling around the world has always been fun, educational, and enlightening, but this day was sad, He was 37 years old when he died! Unrecognized for his genius. Poor, misunderstood, and disturbed. It would be years before most people started to acknowledge how great an artist he was.

 What a waste.

The last part of this post will also be a tribute to someone who's long gone.

 Napoleon.

Also a genius, albeit a military genius, so what's odd about the rest of this post is that I'll admit I feel differently about him than the artists I wrote about earlier. I'm not a fan of violence or war but both are part of the world we live in and Napoleon was a genius in the art of war.

 Of course there is also the blockbuster movie released last year starring "Joaquin Phoenix".

 All in all, since Joani and I were in Paris we decide we would go to see his Tomb.

 It is located at Les Invalides, The Military Museum, so after Visiting Musee Rodin which was right across the street, we crossed over and headed into the largest group of buildings we had been to yet and almost immediately found out that in order to actually see Napoleon's Tomb, we would have to pay upwards of $60 CDN. to see it.

It was an easy decision for Joani and me to pass on this.  After all we saw Van Gogh's grave for free. Same cost for Edith Piaf, George Seurat, Jim Morrison, Frederic Chopin, and with all of that I just couldn't see myself paying for the right to see someone who was for all intents purposes a specialist in killing.

 We did get far enough to see this.

 Don't mean to offend any Napoleon fans.

 Garry

 Art Galleries Part 1

Today was our first full day in Paris, so of course we spent a fair amount of time at the Orsay. For those of you that don't know, both Joani and I are avid art lovers and the Orsay has the largest collection of impressionist art in the world including my second favourite all time painting, "Starry Night over the Rhone" by Vincent Van Gogh.  Today it also had another one of my favourites, "Soleil Levant" by Claude Monet. I say had, because "Soleil Levant's" normal home is at  Musee Marmottan in a different area of Paris and we probably wouldn't have gotten a chance to see it this trip if it wasn't part of a visiting exhibition to the Orsay.

  We were lucky enough to see both on our first trip to Paris 10 years ago but it was very fortuitous that Monet's painting was on loan to the Orsay when we were there today. I have said on several occasions that Joani and I travel under a lucky star and this again proves it in my mind.

  While we were standing in line this morning both paintings were on my mind as well as all the excitement of seeing the entire Orsay collection! The Impressionist era of art was the golden age in my opinion which makes a second trip to the Orsay more than exciting. The first time I was there, I felt completely overwhelmed and as odd as it may seem, after a while I lost focus and couldn't take in all I was seeing. 

 I was determined this time to slow down and take however much time I needed and stay composed throughout the entire visit. Just take it all in and enjoy.

 This of course, turned out to be the best laid plans of mice and men. We got to the Orsay around 10:30 am which seemed about right with it being a Wednesday and the Art gallery opening at 9:30am. Should give me lots of time. Imagine my shock to see 3 different crowded lines of people, maybe totaling 200 or more! This was not in the plan. I wanted to walk in and be strolling along with Joani and a small group of fellow art lovers while I fell back in love with Van Gogh, Renoir, Monet, etc. Instead I was standing in line with groups of Hippies, school children, art guides and Parisians, all crowding in on my time. Why was I expected to share my favourite artists and their paintings with all this riffraff? Let me tell you, I was not happy.

 School children are not interested in art. Art guides are pretentious know it alls,  Parisians are, well, Parisians! And hippies with their backpacks and beards shouldn't be allowed in art galleries.

 It took us 30 to 45 minutes to get inside and I was hyperventilating the whole time. Luckily enough when we got inside it only took a few minutes to get our admission tickets, get through the turnstiles and start seeing the Art.

  It is very lucky for me that I travel with Joani. I was standing in the main auditorium of the greatest Art gallery in the world, spinning around trying to tell her how I felt and the only words that would come out were....."oh Boo!" twice. She tapped me on the arm and said "it's okay, where do you want to start." 

 After that long/short story, let me show you Art that is inspired and inspiring, also extremely emotional.

Everything that I say in these posts is just opinion so if you are reading this, keep that in mind.

Just my opinion!

I will start with my favourite painting in the gallery and it is done by Van Gogh of course! 

Joani once told me that no other piece of art moves her like  "Starry night over the Rhone" .

Firstly, I think this is the best example of the technique Impasto painting that you will ever see. The paint is applied thickly with brush, trowel and sometimes squeezed directly onto the canvas in whirls and ridges. It becomes almost a three dimensional piece of art, and if you play the gallery lights off it in the right way, it becomes almost like a hologram where the stars in the sky sparkle and the lights on the Rhone river seem to move with the waves. It manages to evoke wonder, imagination, emotion and curiousity all at once.

 I love it more than I can say

This next painting is also a masterpiece in my mind and before you smile and think that I would assign the word "masterpiece" to tons of art I will tell you that I have a definitive top ten list of my favourite paintings in the world, and these first two are are in the top five. 

This painting is by Monet and is called "Soleil Levant". Monet has similarly managed to create an impression of movement but differently than Van Gogh. He spent a lifetime studying the effects of light playing off of different subjects, most famously painting Lilies at various times of the day, in various weather conditions, and various seasons. Not because he was crazy about Lilies, but because he was fascinated with how light conditions could change a subject. He did the same thing with haystacks, Cathedrals, and other subjects, and in doing so he mastered the effect that light can have on an object more than any other artist, living or dead.

 When you stand in front of he canvas below, you can see the suns rays sparkling and moving across the waves, and the small boat seems to be rocking in the water before your eyes.

It is Wondrous!

I'm not going to go on in depth concerning every painting I will show you. These two are, as I've already said, two of my favourite paintings in the world and I had to explain why.

I'll follow these up with more pieces of art that each in their own way, is also extremely beautiful and maybe you can see something that will draw you to the Orsay in Paris.

This is a piece from Seurat, done of course in the style of Pointillism.

I was surprised to see this next painting at the Orsay as it was done by Honore Daumier and he painted much earlier than the impressionists, but the subject matter... "Don Quixote and Sancho Panza" fascinates me. We should all "Tilt at windmills" at one point or another in our lifetimes.

The next three paintings are by Edgar Degas, another amazing artist who painted in the impressionist era. I am fascinated with his fascination with Ballerinas. Although I haven't included any, he was as famous for his sculpting's as his paintings.

The next two paintings were done by what was probably the two most famous artists in their time. The first is a "Renoir" and the second is a "Monet". Renoir's painting has a realism quality that makes you think you could almost jump into the scene and start dancing, while the Monet painting has a quality almost dreamlike, like a picnic amidst the clouds.

These next two are from the same two artists and the question is who did which?

I'll finish with More From Van Gogh

I have a print of this painting below, in my gym

This painting featured prominently in the BBC classic Scifi series " Dr Who"

  Now I simply have to walk away.

 But I really feel I can honestly say

 It's been a very magical day

 Amidst my artist friends

  At 

  the 

Musee

 D'Orsay

 

Garry

Art Galleries, Cemeteries and more!

 

 When Joani and I talked about going to Paris, My original thought was... "The Orsay"! The greatest collection of impressionist art in the world in my opinion. Having seen it once, I thought, I have to go back. For those of you who are thinking, wow, his poor wife, I am going to tell you that Joani loves art as much as I do. Our tastes in art run different at times, but there's a big overlap in tastes and we can each appreciate the differences.

 After The Orsay, my only other thought was the " Orangerie", another art gallery across the Seine with more impressionist and post impressionist art that we hadn't seen the first time we were in Paris.

 So when it came time to actually plan the trip, I told Joani that these were my only two priorities and that she was in charge of our agenda, knowing full well that she would come up with some hidden gems to round out our short jaunt to "The City of Light" If you know Joani, you know that she never disappoints, hence the cemeteries. We managed to visit two cemeteries and one tomb and while I'll explain in detail in a later post, they were all very interesting. And I'll mention that we visited two other Art galleries, plus Montmartre which basically holds an outdoor art gallery every day. Did a wine tour and tasting in the heart of Paris, and basically walked for hours every day through the Labyrinth of streets in Paris, getting lost, finding ourselves, only to get lost again and again almost every day.

 Now for some random photos taken on our whirlwind trip.

We'll start with Joani and a reminder that Paris is hosting the Olympics this year, and I forgot to mention that all of our travels also consisted of navigating around numerous large construction sites devoted to event sites as well as extra athlete and visitor housing, so every day we would leave our temporary housing with a travel plan which would continually be subject to change and adaptation, to get around closed streets, subway stations, and entire city blocks. I love a challenge and Joani loves me so we always prevailed.

This is a view from a window in the Orsay and I've tucked it in here because I need to say that everyone should go to Paris at least once to take a walk along the Seine.

 Any Visit to Paris isn't complete without going to the Arc de Triomphe. 

When construction is finished this will be the new, refurbished Notre Dame Cathedral.

This Dome was our our sightline help for finding the Tomb of Napoleon.

Joani and I loves cats. We have two of our own which only increases my fascination with this photo. This street artist plays the accordion and as he opens and squeezes shut the accordion bellows, the cat crosses from one side to the other. If our cats are any indication, cats are untrainable, but this cat was a performance artist very much enjoying itself and this duo were doing a great business on the streets of Montmartre.

 A scene from the top of Montmartre

And I'll end with how I started. A photo of Joani. 

True confession time. This is all being posted from home as my blog site would not allow me access without security protocols which included getting a phone call to my home phone number. This prevented me from posting on the road as I usually do but I wrote most of my thoughts down at the end of each day and referred back to elaborate notes to start posting.

 I'm  going to either bore or captivate you with three or four more posts about this short trip. We packed a lot in.

 Garry