old family blog

Picasso Museum

Clem and I headed over to Picasso museum today. We are finally taking in some good art. Along the way we stopped at the Pompidou fountains and looked more great buildings along the way. We loved the colorful fountains and took a couple of pictures. It was amazing the abundance of mopeds and motorcycles in Paris. Along with all the smart cars, It’s a bummer the smart car craze did not take off in the states, especially in SF.

On the way to the museum we happened along a truck that a graffiti artist had painted. An amazing green and white portrait of a black woman. Several points this trip, the discussion of what is graffiti art and what is not. This is most certainly an example of graffiti art. About one block from the museum was a plaque on a building that was once a school. The plaque was honoring all the children who attended the school and were taken off to concentration camps.

The Picasso museum building was impressive. A former hotel – or home to a former patron and collector of his work. When we arrived the information provided about the current exhibit. We were all excited that it was a collection of works from the Picasso museum in Barcelona. The visiting exhibit turned out to be a collection of sketches and sketch books from Picasso’s work from 1906 to 1950. Although I photographer a number of pieces.

There was practically no Paintings in the collection. My favorite piece in the collection was the watercolor of the witch. It had beautiful bright colors with almost a Renoir quality. Another set of sketches that I did like was the sketches of his 4 wives.

The main floor and basement held the work from museum permanent collection. Many amazing pieces were on display. This section was not the most organized; several painting spanning 70 years were mixed together. Like the impressionist style painting of a woman lying naked which was one of his earlier works when he first met Manet. Or the abstract watercolor of the ram skull and candle (Clem’s favorite) which was from the 60’s.

Overall the collection did show how Picasso desire to reinvent or experiment drove his work. I saw so many transitions as well as similarities to other artists like Renoir, Manet, Miro and Chagall. We are really looking forward to visiting the d’Orsay, Louvre and Grand Palais next week.

After we left the Picasso museum we decided to walk over to Notre Dame. We walked down a couple of shopping streets near the museum and found this amazing kids clothing store. Parisian kids have it all, the best clothes and toys. At bookstore we bought some postcards. When we excited the store someone had left their kid out front in the stroller. It was hilarious; he was just hanging out of the stroller. I took a picture of it for prosperity. LOL

Along the way we walked down the small shopping streets of Isle de Louis. And then we stopped for some ice cream that Eric had taken Clem to the day before. Clem went for the decadent chocolate while I splurged and tried the white chocolate and another scoop of Caramel. It was delicious!

We walked across the bridge over to Notre Dame. We approached the church from the backside, which is in a dire need of cleaning. Plus it was sad to see so many of the gargoyles used for water run off, broken off. In its place were grey PVC pipes for drainage. So we made our way to the front of the church and noticed a group of high school kids gathering outside some building. Every just stood around (40-50) just talking and hanging out. It was like being in a Godard film.

What impressed me the most at the front of the church were the carvings above the doorways. From the apostles lined up for dinner to the little naked boys and priest adorning the arches. Hmmm, the very interesting? The inside was very big, but as I told Clem, not as big as I was expecting. Unfortunately the inside is very dark and medieval – so you could not see the details very much. A service was underway and the priest singing the hymns had a very beautiful voice.

I walked around to most of the station which can light a candle. I finally found a station for St. Jeanne of Arc. I light a candle for everyone. Later in the day we got the great news my brother and his wife are officially pregnant and with TWINS. We plan on going back to Notre Dame and light a candle for each of them before we leave. After Notre Dame we hung out in the plaza in front and watching people walk in and out. It was early evening and it was beautiful outside.

Afterwards Clem showed me the flower market, which was closed. I hope to go back sometime next week and see it open. As we crossed the bridge back to the right bank we too photos of the Eiffel Tower in the sunset. It was amazing. As we stood on the bridge we noticed this young guy handing near us or moving with us every time we moved. We stopped and moved probably 3 times on the bridge and each time he kind of laid back and posed. We figured he was a street hustler. At one point I was taking a picture of Clem and got a shot of him. We told our friend Eric about the guy and showed him the photo and he confirmed yes he was a hustler. The funny thing is in America we would have propositioned in the first 10 minutes, this boy never did!

As we walked back to the apartment we stopped at one of the booksellers along Siene. And we meet a really nice guy who spoke great English. He mostly sold comics or cartoon books. Clem bought an old Tin Tin book in French. The seller told us about his recent trip to San Diego to the ComiCon convention. It was great to hear about his impression of Californians. He kept apologizing for his bad English but he was almost fluent. Later Eric told us the whole apology thing is generational, most of the older generations are excited to learn English but are careful to apologize for any errors before the occur.

posted by turlie @ 9:07 AM