Paris, again.

Our most recent trip to Paris didn’t go as smoothly as the last, but was good nonetheless. For me, this trip involved a lot of museum time, which is a big part of the reason I’m here. As a former art student, and on-again off-again fine artist (definitely more off-again for the past several years), the lure of Paris museums is irresistible to me.

On Wednesday I went back to the Pompidou, this time to see a special show of Futurist art from the early 20th century. I went ahead and bought the accompanying audio tour, which definitely helped point out details long forgotten from my art school days. It was a really great show.

On Thursday I was able to get a ticket to see the much-hyped Picasso show («Picasso et les maîtres» — “Picasso and the masters”) at the Grand Palais. I’m a big Picasso fan, and have gone out of my way to see his work many times over the years. I have to say, this was not my favorite show. The point of this show was to demonstrate how Picasso was not just influenced by, but how he directly interpreted many of the works by the masters of the art world. This show is actually being held at 3 different museums, although the one at the Grand Palais is by far the largest.

David and I saw a portion of the show at the Musée d’Orsay last week, which I enjoyed more. That part focused solely on Picasso’s interpretations of Manet’s «Dejeunner Sur L’herbe». The show at the Grand Palais had several hundred paintings (by Picasso and the others), most of which I had never seen, but they just weren’t among my favorites. Also, despite the attempts at crowd control by selling tickets for specific time slots, it was mobbed. I like to be close enough to lick the art (something I actually haven’t tried). I like to be able to virtually crawl inside the paintings — to really experience the color, the play of light, the scale, and especially the texture. This is what seeing the art in person is all about — these are the details you can’t reproduce in a book.

(Side note: this is actually something I’ve recently realized about the way I look at things: I’m very interested in texture. When David and I are out taking photographs, I’m often shooting the cobblestones or the layers of paint on a section of wall, as opposed to the landmarks of Paris. When I have some time in the coming days, I’ll start a Flickr gallery of the texture shots I’ve been taking.)

While I was taking in the art, David and Anna were having adventures of their own. Of note was the Cité des Sciences et l’Industrie, which sounds amazing. They loved it, which is great. I’m sure David will blog about it and post some of his amazing pictures soon. I have to admit that things like that just don’t hold my interest at all. I’m a big believer in playing to your parenting strengths. David and Anna can geek out together and both love it. I, OTOH, am right there for reading stories, doing art projects, cooking and baking, teaching French, etc. It sounds much more Martha than I actually am!

Paris

Paris was a whirlwind. On the train back I said to David, “Did we really just take the train into Paris yesterday?” We packed in a lot.

On Tuesday we arrived in Paris at 11 am and took a taxi directly to the hotel to drop off our stuff. We’ve found a great B&B that we’ve made our home when we’re there. It’s expensive, but any decent place seems to be and this is a lovely, small (12 rooms), place owned by a British couple who make their own jam (need I say more?). They go out of their way to make you feel comfortable, have a fridge and dining room you can use for meals, and have Wi-Fi.

After getting settled we walked to the Eiffel Tower and then hopped the Batobus for a quick ride along the Seine to the Musée d’Orsay. Having learned that food always makes my daughter happier, we stopped in at a lovely little Italian place for some pasta and a glass of wine first. I then decided to resort to the use of bribes to convince her to “rest” in her stroller for an hour while David and I cruised the museum. Of course, the resting never happened, and there were several meltdowns in the museum, but it was well worth it. Afterwards I had to make good on my promise, so I took us on an interminably long and circuitous route (I misread the map) to what turned out to be fabulous gelato (for A) and much needed coffee (for us).

The following morning, after the requisite croissant and jam at the B&B, we set off for Notre Dame (billed as a “castle” to Anna). Surprisingly this was among the easiest sightseeing destinations we’ve had with Anna, probably because I kept pointing out all the “kings” and “princesses” on the walls. The best part, however, was the creche which had been modernized with computerized lights that I’m at a bit of a loss to describe. I’m embedding photos that won’t begin to do it justice. Suffice it to say that we were all mesmerized for a full 10 minutes just watching the baby Jesus and his princess posse get all sparkly and colorful.

Of course by then little miss was once again starving, so we stopped for fabulous crêpes and vin chaud at a stand by the cathedral. (Side note: vin chaud is a hot spiced wine and is super yummy. I Googled for recipes and plan on drinking it daily for the rest of the winter in place of the Emergen-C I was drinking stateside.) After we refueled we headed to the Centre Pompidou, stopping first at the amazing fountain outside. Despite the rain, we all had such a great time looking at all the outrageous Niki Saint Phalle sculptures (I got some great photos — definitely head over to the Flickr page to see them all).

Inside the Pompidou I got a painfully short, but totally rapturous 45 minutes to myself in the Art Moderne 1905-1950 section, which is where my passions lie. Room after room of Picasso, Matisse, Chagall, Miró — just ecstasy for me. I will definitely be going back for several hours before our trip ends. This was followed by (what else) more food, this time awesome Israeli falafels in the Marais district (I could seriously lead eating tours through Paris). Then we raced to the previously mentioned stroller rental shop, cabbed it to the hotel and then to the train station, and were back in Rouen by dinner time.

Today we just hung out and took it easy. Anna found a copy of “Monsters, Inc.” which she’d never seen (up till now, the only feature film she’d seen was “Finding Nemo”) so we put it on the big screen here with the projector and all sat together watching it. Quite a treat to just watch a matinee on a Thursday afternoon all together.

And now, it’s bedtime. Bonne nuit.