Observations 8.19

This is just an addition to yesterday's post. It's a second video Dior film from Versailles with more outside shots and less of the Hall of Mirrors.


Dior - Secret Garden 2 - Versailles
from Inez & Vinoodh on Vimeo.

"Inez Van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin disclose Versailles is a more intimate way. The chateau and its park abound with well-kept secrets. The heart of the royal lands conceals an extraordinary world of poetry and color: in the depth of its mysterious woods a secret garden blooms out of sight, inhabited by flower-women. From the Petit Trianon to the enchanted forest, the Top-model, Daria Strokous becomes the reincarnation of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France, of fashion and elegance. The painting “Le Déjeuner sur l’Herbe” of Edouard Manet becomes the picturesque backdrop of the dreamlike tale embodied by Daria and transposed at the Château de Versailles."

Observations from the Window 8.18

I suppose I could say I'm officially obsessed. Not that I haven't to some degree been obsessed with France, more specifically with Paris, my whole life. At the moment it's worse than it's ever been, much worse.

I just finished reading The Story of Paris and now have Thomas Carlyle's The French Revolution, Charles Dukeyonge's The Life of Marie Antoinette, Jeanne Louise Henriette Campan's Memoirs of the Court of Marie Antoinette, and François Auguste Marie Mignet's History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814 all lined up on my Kindle.

Add to the reading list the course I'm registered for at NYU, Women Writers in France (12^th century to the present), and you begin to see what I mean by obsession.

How bad is it? I can watch this short film and not see the models or hear one of my favorite songs. All I see is Versailles' Hall of Mirrors which is something I neglected to see last year. I won't make that mistake next time.


Christian Dior - Secret Garden - Versailles
from Inez & Vinoodh on Vimeo.

"Secret Garden - Versailles"
A film by Inez and Vinoodh
Starring Daria Strokus, Melissa Stasiuk and Xiao Wen Ju in La Galeries Des Glaces - Château de Versailles.
Music by Depeche Mode: 'Enjoy the Silence'

"Before the camera lens of Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin, the looks from the fall 2012 collection are brought to glorious life. In a deserted Versailles, as if plucked from a fantasy, the model Daria Strokous invites you to follow her on a wondrous path that winds through the Galerie des Glaces, through the palace's endless interconnecting salons, as far as the grand tree-lined walks that sweep through the classic parkland à la française.

Along the way she's joined by fellow models Melissa Stasiuk and Xiao Wen Ju for a dreamlike fashion show where Versailles is transformed into Christian Dior's secret garden, his emblematic château. D'or et Dior."

Observations from the Shore 7.6

I've been trying to stay away from politics as much as possible this week but I have to mention this. You know I love Paris and I love the French language but there are times I'm not so sure how I feel about France or the French in general. That being said there are times you just have to admire the arrogance of the French.

Every year on the 4^th of July the American ambassador to France holds a garden party. This year's guest of honor was French Interior Minister Manuel Valls who proceeded to lecture the attendees on the NSA spying operations. The minister said that "in the name of our friendship, we owe each other honesty. We must say things clearly, directly, frankly." He also said "such practices, if proven, do not have their place between allies and partners." The comments probably didn't go over well but I can't say they are totally out of line given what's been revealed. But this post is about French arrogance so I'll move on.

On the very same day Valls was scolding the ambassador's garden party Le Monde was published with this headline, "Révélations sur le Big Brother français." Yes it seems the NSA isn't the only organization spying on its citizens and allies. According to the paper's investigation the DGSE, France's equivalent of the CIA and NSA combined, spied on French citizens both inside and outside the country. It collected phone calls, emails and internet activity. It even spied on their Twitter and Facebook accounts. But the DGSE didn't just collect metadata for future use it used the data to "map" who was talking to who.

Meanwhile French President François Hollande has suspended talks on the EU-US free trade pact until he receives a full explanation of American surveillance operations. Hollande has repeatedly said that he "cannot accept this kind of behavior between partners and allies."

Maybe this is just typical French arrogance but it also raises a question. If it's not just arrogance is the French government extremely hypocritical or just incredibly naive?

A spokesman for the DGSE in Paris refused to comment on Le Monde's report.

7/7 update - This is on a related topic so I thought I would just add it to this post. The MIT Media Lab has finally released Immersion, a program that had been in development for a few years. When you grant Immersion access to your e-mail account (currently only Gmail) it creates a map of your personal network. Each collaborator, a person with whom you have exchanged at least three e-mails, is given a circle, which is connected to all the other circles in your big web of relationships. If you are interested follow the link for more information. Unlike the government databases all the info Immersion collects CAN be permanently deleted when you are finished.

Observations on Art 5.7

Madame Jeanne Lanvin, 1937

You might begin to wonder why a post about a fragrance gets the art heading. One reason is I have never had a fashion heading and I'm not about to start now. The other is that there is a bit of a history lesson ahead. I could even argue that fragrance is as much an art as any other just art for the sense of smell instead of sight but I'm not going to. Artists tend to agree that anything an artist calls art is in fact art but art historians get picky about it, I fall in between the two, but that's a totally different thought.

The fragrance is called Me and was created by the artistic director and head designer of Lanvin in Paris, Moroccan born Alber Elbaz. For years I've had a habit of wearing a men's cologne from Ralph Lauren so it take something special to intrigue me. In this case it was the main tone (highly technical term) which in Me comes from the zest of sparkling blueberries.

The history lesson comes in when you start to look at Lanvin itself. Founded by Madame Jeanne Lanvin in 1889 Lanvin is the oldest fashion house in Paris. Madame Lanvin was heavily influenced by art and the walls of her Paris apartment were covered with works by Edgar Degas, Pierre Auguste Renoir, Eugène Boudin, and Edouard Vuillard.

During a trip to Florence, Italy Lanvin saw a fresco by Fra Angelico, an Early Italian Renaissance painter, in which he used the shade of blue now known as quattrocento. The word quattrocento comes from the Italian word for 1400 and refers to the art and culture of 15^th century Italy. Lanvin developed her own variation of quattrocento blue, now known as Lanvin Blue, that became the signature color of her fashion house and the Coke of color. To this day Lanvin blue's formula is secret and since 1923 has only been manufactured in Lanvin's own dye factories in France.

In the review the designer Alber Elbaz describes the woman he thinks would wear his fragrance. "She is, or would like to be, a Parisian, because our house is so evocative of France's capital and because the city is so synonymous with sensuality and elegance."

Blueberries and Paris,  yes I was intrigued and maybe now you understand why.

*There is a good selection of quattrocento art work on The Metropolitan Museum of Art's art history timeline. Also the Met's Costume Institute has a large collection of vintage Lanvin designs. And some trivia, in January 2010 the French postal system, Le Post, issued limited edition Lanvin stamps.

Sunday Observations 4.28

We finally got a gorgeous spring weekend in the northeast. The way things seem to go now it will probably be the only one we get before the weather jumps right into summer so I decide it was time to check on my shore, the first time I have since Sandy. I knew it was still there but I wanted to see for myself and the need to get Foxy on the road, combined with the weather, made for a good excuse. I'll post more on what we found later.

Last Sunday HBO's Game Of Thrones finished with possibly the so far best scene of the series. I've read five of the books so I knew what was coming but Daenerys' kick ass "I understood every word you said and now you are going to die" scene was done to perfection. Here is a link to the scene, until YouTube takes it down, but the real reason for writing this was I get to use a pic of the mother of all dragons with this post. The problem with GOT is that now we probably wont see Daenerys again for a couple of weeks. Hopefully I'm wrong because that would be such a shame.

On a totally different topic the Out Magazine Gay Power list for 2013 is out and it looks like the news and political people are taking over with Senator Tammy Baldwin, Fox News' Shepard Smith, The New York Times' Nate Silver, CNN's Anderson Cooper, and Rachel Maddow all in the top ten. You can find the complete list here. By the way, I'm not sure if that out pun was intended or not.

A few months ago there was an article in The New York Times T Magazine about a site called Gidsy which I never got around to playing with. As the article says Gidsy "enables travelers and other novelty seekers to find activities organized by what it refers to as "real people." Rather than get into it I'll let you read the article but what is fun is picking a city and searching for tours to see what comes up. Paris has a number of catacomb tours (one called the "Empire of Death" tour), a Monet's Garden bike tour, a chocolate and pastry tasting tour, and to finish the day either a pub crawl or a champagne tasting tour. A visit to New York could be highlighted by the Jewish Gangstas of the Lower East Side Tour, a mobile scavenger hunt, or a paranormal and ghost tour. After any of those tours the three hour historic pub tour, in which you "hear stories of the pubs' histories and the famous drinkers who frequented them," might be a necessary end to your day in New York. It seems like a bargain at $75 but only if drinks are included.

Have you ever read "Reamde" by Neal Stephenson? If you have you seriously need to read this article in Times about former Phillies and Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling, "Rhode Island and the Fall of 38 Studios." I swear when I read the article I immediately thought of the Stephenson novel because it seemed like Schilling's company was writing its very own version of T'Rain. If you never read the novel that makes absolutely no sense but the article is worth reading if only for the political side of it.

For some unknown reason the isn't a Sunday Times to be had in South Jersey today and I have no idea how I am supposed to function without one. I suppose I'll have to make do with sticky buns and coffee.

Observations on Art 3.24

We stumbled onto a good list in the Art and Design section of Complex magazine's website, "100 Museums to Visit Before You Die." Like I said it's a good list but it doesn't say if it is in any kind of order. I don't see how it can be with MoMA at 56 while the Met is at 3, the Philadelphia Museum of Art is at 4, and the Louvre is at 7. I love the Philadelphia Museum but more than MoMA and the Louvre? No way. Another sure sign of no order is that something called The Simone Handbag Museum in Seoul, South Korea is in the first spot.

Of course everything becomes a competition so we had to compare who had been to what museum and I came out the winner at twenty four. The Galerie nationale du Jeu de Paume, The Drawing Center, Institute of Contemporary Art Boston, International Center of Photography, Brooklyn Museum, MoMA PS1, The Museum of Modern Art, Museum of Arts and Design, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Whitney Museum of American Art, The Phillips Collection, MAD Museum, Andy Warhol Museum, New York Historical Society, Centre Georges Pompidou, New Museum, National Gallery of Art, Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, Museum of Fine Arts Boston, American Museum of Natural History, Musée du Louvre, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Philadelphia Museum of Art, and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum.

A few museums not on the list that I think should be are the National Art Museum of China in Beijing, the Shaanxi History Museum, and Shanghai's Museum of Contemporary Art. I think the list totally neglects Chinese art, the art and culture with the longest history, and concentrates on Japanese art.

Off the top of my head the museums on the list that I hope to get to are the Tate Modern, Palace of Versailles, Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna, Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya, the Vatican Museums, Museo Reina Sofia, and the Hermitage. I suppose I need to spend some time in Europe unless I go to China instead. To bad I didn't win that big lottery last night.

Yes I have been busy but that still leaves 76 museums to visit. One less than that if I skip that purse museum in Seoul.

Observations from the Window 1.3.1

The first new post of year four is going to be something a little different for me. I'm going to respond to a few suggestions, comments, and reminders from the past few days.

A friend of mine reminded me that if this is the start of the fourth year of this blog it's also the start of my fourth year in the Village. I hadn't even thought of that but it's very true. It's also a little hard to admit but I think I feel more at home here now than I do in the mountains and that is something I didn't think I would ever say. I still think of my dad's as home though, that is until I plant myself in that apartment in Paris.

Lately I've been told that sometimes I'm a bit too harsh in my comments, something that I think was intended as much for me personally as for my writing. To be honest for the most part I've always been that way but as I got older I also realized that anything else was totally a waste of your time and mine. I don't see my ever changing that opinion.

Someone recently mentioned that I don't write about personal things very often. My answer to that was that if there was a story to be had it was in here somewhere. There isn't much of a personal nature I haven't written about that I intend to write about, it's all in here somewhere but it might take some digging to find it. Something you are not going to find in here are bad personal relationship stories because, as Ash says, you aren't ready for them, can't handle them, just don't want to know. Also I don't plan on ever writing about my relationship with Anne Hathaway.

Finally earlier today I had a suggestion from somebody who has been reading this since I started. He left a very kind comment but than suggested I "skip the effing sports section." I would seriously consider this but I'm not quite sure what if anything Swedes know about sports so I'll just have to shrug it off as a well meaning but totally off suggestion.

Sarcasm, than again maybe it isn't.

Observations 10.22

Ash showed me an old blog post she thought I would like and I thought I would do my own version of it. I seem to have lost the link but I remember the quote by Robert Brault it started with; "Enjoy the little things, for one day you may look back and realize they were the big things." It was a list of the thirty little things that matter in her life, small things that normally get overlooked or are taken for granted. Hers was maybe a bit too faith based for my liking but still it was a good idea, for what it's worth here is my much shorter list. It was off the top of my head so don't give it more weight than it deserves.

The color black. Yeah I know, is black even a color? By definition black is a total lack of color because it absorbs all light and with it all color. I had an 'argument' with a professor once because I said if black absorbs all color isn't it a saturation, or combination, of them all? To this day I stick by my argument whenever I see him.

The color blue. Indigo, turquoise, and all 60 shades in between. Good coffee and music. The smile on the face of a total stranger. A warm bath with candles on a cold night. Cold nights. Art museums, granted this isn't a small thing or always cheap but it's my list and I love museums, all the paintings and the smell of old oil paints. Chili peppers.

I haven't had this happen in some time but that feeling I get when I work on a painting than suddenly step back and realized it's finished. You can't understand it unless its happened to you and photos don't count, I've found it just isn't the same.

A good movie, the kind you watch, go back to the beginning, and watch all over again. The moments before a snow storm when it is totally calm and quiet. Walking barefoot on a wet beach. Books, real paper in the hand type books. Getting the Sunday New York Times before the sun comes up, a weirdly priceless thing. Vintage photos. van Gogh. Paris.

My last two are in no way small things but I can't make any kind of list of this sort without mentioning them. Talking to a small group of close friends that have been with me for years, like my sisters. And finally, my family, always my family, any time I can spend with them. I should add I mean my immediate family and not the conservative branch that thinks I am the devil's daughter incarnate.

Did I mention politics? I thought so.

Observations from the Window 10.1

Saturday I mentioned how one of the fun things about the NY Art Book Fair is its lack of auctions, super high priced items, and "celebrity" booths. I hadn't read my brochure ahead of time so I was in for a bit of a surprise when we walked downstairs. In the basement was a faux library called "Homage To Mike Kelley" and assembled by Larry Gagosian. Kelley died of an apparent suicide in January of this year. The room was dominated by two cases filled with books and music selected by friends from Kelley's personal collection and included a copy of Milton's Paradise Lost, Nietzsche's The Birth Of Tragedy, and a complete collection of The Stooges' CDs. It was a cool idea, even if Gagosian came up with it, so I suppose I was pleasantly surprised.

Another fun element of the NYABF is watching people deal with the cash only policy. There was a time I loved going to flea markets and yard sales back in Pennsylvania, collecting old CDs and books, so I'm totally used to that. Art people in New York don't often seem to have cash so after dropping whatever they have on a vintage program or book they madly scramble for the one ATM machine in the building.

Than there is the Outdoor Co-ed Topless Pulp Fiction Appreciation Society. Leave any questions you have on this in the comments, otherwise some other time.

Later I was again pleasantly surprised, this time by a movie we watched after dinner. I'm in no way a fan of Woody Allen but I really wanted to see Midnight In Paris, probably as much for the gorgeous scenery as anything else. Well now I can honestly say I have seen a Woody Allen movie that I would watch again, actually I already have. Most of the nostalgia scenes take place in the Montmartre district, the same district of Paris as Christopher Moore's "Sacre Bleu" just forty years later, so next time I'm in Paris I must go there at midnight, I'll meet Hemingway yet. If you haven't seen it yet it's well worth renting, the cinematography is at times is just totally stunning, and it's a fun story to think about.

Before I finish, one line that did irritate me, yes even movies do irritate me sometimes, was when a present day intellectual type says that nostalgia is nothing but denial of one's present life. Now it's true I can be nostalgic to a fault sometimes, so that was one irritant, but I also figure that if nostalgia is denial than art history is denial on a grand scale. Than I had to remember that it was a Woody Allen movie and I also remembered why I don't like him. That 'I want to be somewhere else' feeling sparks creativity in more artists and writers than almost anything else, in all likelihood including Woody Allen.

At some level I could just relate to the movie. Seriously, who wouldn't want to drift back in time and visit some heroes in their element? 

Observations from the Window 9.16

It was still dark when I took my coffee and wandered to the roof early Friday morning. The slimmest of crescent moons hung over the Village in the cool air, simply one of those mornings I lived for in the mountains. Sometimes my mountains seem so far away, like they are from a totally different life. Still, Fall is in the air and if it's not quite the same in the Village there is no missing it on crisp clear mornings like the past few.

I have to say that the past three or four weeks have been rather hectic for me, sometimes excruciatingly so. There was my trip to Paris, the VQs made their return from Boston, and the political conventions didn't give my politically addicted brain much of a rest. On top of those I have been stressing over a personal issue for a couple of months now and I happened turn 30 in August.

So yes I do love this time of year but as with anything involving me it isn't all that clear cut. Fall just seems to be the time of year my brain reboots. I suppose you could call it the start of my mental year probably due to spending too many years at PSU. This year it just seems to be worse than others have been because of all the things I just mentioned. I start to dwell on what I want to do, where I want to be, and how the hell I'm going to get there. Painting, writing, and photography all are competing for limited time. This is also the one time of year I still so miss my mountains and I just don't have the time to get back there as much as I would like. That makes me start to think that maybe I should have just stayed there all along. See what I mean about the mess my brain becomes?

Than again it seems I left myself a clue this year. I did happen to ship all those acrylics back from Paris. There must have been a reason for that.

A brief Fall sports update; the Phillies are making a totally unexpected run at the last playoff spot in the National League (but proceeded to lose 2 out of 3 games to the worst team in baseball), the post-Paterno era of Penn State football is off to a totally expected dismal start (but crushed Navy for their first win), and the Flyers seem to be locked out in an NHL labor dispute (but ... well no buts here, locked out).

Finally a rather fitting quote from Leo Tolstoy that I posted on one of my tumblrs and has been reblogged over a thousand times ....

"If you want to be happy, be"

Observations from le Voyage 8.26.1, mobile update

I may have mentioned last week how stunning it was flying into the sunrise. A week later chasing the endless sunset isn't quite the same thing. When your body thinks it is about 1AM and the sun refuses to set you start to feel like some human version of the British Empire. Than to taught you the sun finally sets just an hour out of JFK. To make matters worse we were delayed in the air over JFK for 20 minutes because of TS Issac related delays and airport closings to the south.

I'm not a big fan of baggage claim so when my bags were the last out all I could think was that my best two leather jackets had been lost over the Atlantic. It was not the case however and all my leather arrived safe and sound.

So I'm back, a bit sad maybe, most assuredly exhausted,
but back just the same.

Observations from le Voyage 8.26

Sitting outside at a cafe across from my one time hotel, sipping iced coffee, while my bags are all packed and stacked in the hotel lobby waiting to go home. Sadly I don't think I'm as ready for that trip as they seem to be. The inside of the cafe was decorated by Catherine Deneuve and though it looks good I'm not at all sure what she was after. It has the feel of a large living room but I mean seriously, a glass coffee table? It has a nice terrace to sit outside and ponder life so I wont complain about it. Actually I haven't found anything to complain about since I'm here other than the fact that I wont be here much longer. One thing I do miss is my Sunday New York Times, the IHT is basically the same thing but yet it isn't, something about it just seems off. It makes no matter as my cab is here to take me to Charles de Gaul, meh ....

When I was still at the cafe my brother called to ask when my flight landed at JFK and he got a bit confused when I answered. He wasn't the first to be confused by my schedule as it wasn't all that easy explaining to Ash that she should be at the airport just two hours after I left. It goes like this, my flight leaves CDG at 7PM Paris time and arrives at JFK at 9PM New York time which is six hours behind Paris. All this means is that my eight hour flight only takes two hours off the clock and my mind, not to mention my comps, will think it's 3AM which it will be in Paris. Got it? Well Sean came up with something more, in its day the Concorde made the same Paris/New York flight in three hours so in a way you would arrive in New York before you ever left Paris. Just try and figure that one out.

One thing I learned this week is that I truly do love this city and I really do want it to be mine one day. I also learned that I've changed drastically in the past few years. Thing is I may have changed just as much in the past week but than I suppose dreams will do that to you.

It's about time to board so I want to get this posted quick. It's not going to be my last post about this trip or my last about Paris but it will be my last post from Paris, for now anyway. I plan on being back soon one way or another.

Before I go, my sis moved yesterday and starts classes tomorrow morning. There is a little known secret that says she may even play field hockey but I didn't tell. No, no, not me. Good luck gurl!

Observations from le Voyage 8.25

One exciting thing about my trip is how many times I have been wandering and found a spot where I could just sit and paint which is something tat never happens in New York. There are even some spots in Paris that I wouldn't mind painting, this is something I never do, I just don't paint scenes, landscapes. There really are some exciting possibilities in my mind at the moment, I just hope it doesn't overheat.

Yesterday I mentioned the Sennelier store but I didn't really explain what it was. Sennelier is one of my favorite paint or 'color' merchants. Their paints are thick, almost buttery, but easy to mix on the canvas. Sennilier produces 145 colors and over 100 oil pastels, the later have the consistency of lipstick and were first produced for Picasso in 1949. Below is some background on Sennilier from their website.

"1887, Gustave Sennelier, a devoted chemist and exceptional colorist, established himself as a purveyor of fine-Artists' paints Quia Voltaire in Paris. Surrounded by artists, he developed the first range of colours : Sennelier Artist oil. These quality oil paints have been used for paintings nowdays exhibited in the world's greatest museums. In fact, Sennelier offers a wide range of quality colors that have attracted great painters such as Cezanne, Picasso, Bonnard, Soutine. The Sennelier shop is a meeting place for artists, they maintain creative exchanges that leads to the development of new techniques and unique colours.

Colours that have forged Sennelier's reputation have been retained, such as Madder Lake Deep and Genuine Cobalt Blue, the industry benchmark. Signature transparent colours, such as Chinese Orange and Cinnabar Green, invented by Gustave Sennelier in conjunction with the Impressionists, have contributed significantly to the evolution of art styles through the Fauves, Cubists, and beyond. From Bonnard's blues to Mogdigliani's favorite flesh tones, Sennelier colours have been inspired by the masters and have been an inspiration to them.

2012, the Sennelier products' range has expanded : soft pastel "à l'Ecu", oil pastel and oilstick, watercolor, acrylic, tempera, gouache, ink, with an unchanged regard for quality that allows Sennelier to stay a brand recognized and appreciated by painters. For its 125^th aniversary, Sennelier goes on with increasing fervor to combine the traditions of the Old Masters with the innovations of modern chemistry, to please today and tomorow's Artists asking for vibrant and eternal colours."

Observations from le Voyage 8.24.1

This short has a lot of good shots in it but what makes it totally special is the fact that it was made entirely with an iPhone. I really can't see myself doing anything like this with a phone.

Gabriela Mudado is a Comunication and Arts graduate of PUC Minas, Brazil who wrote her final paper on the films of Tim Burton. A music fanatic she has been working as a DJ for the last 8 years and also has two websites dedicated to French music in Portuguese and in English.


PARIS LA FETE from Gabriela Mudado on Vimeo.
"Many thanks to: Henrique Fares, Kyle Balda, Jackie Jirka, Mariana Berutto, Mateus Berutto, Camila Cortielha, Maíra Fares, Fernanda Fonseca, Lina Hauteville, Brice Michelini and Carla Mudado.
Made entirely with the iPhone 4S."

Observations from le Voyage 8.24

I'm sitting in a cafe just off the Luxembourg Gardens, eating breakfast, pondering what to do with my last 48 hours in Paris. Funny how fast a week can go by. I've been to the Louvre, Montmartre where Christopher Moore's novel Sacre Bleu takes place, walked till my feet are sore, worked some, met some fun people, and did enough shopping to fill that empty bag I brought along. I went to the Père Lachaise Cemetery yesterday and unlike most I didn't visit Jim Morrison's grave but stopped by Oscar Wilde's which was a strange, surreal, moment. It was one of those times where you feel like you had been there before even though you know you hadn't.

Still its been just been a taste, a taste that makes me want to be here even more. I thought I would write much more while I was here but haven't taken the time. I have tons of notes so I'm sure more will follow and I've taken hundreds of photos but looked at so few, posted some I liked on flickr. I'm sure once I'm back in the Village I'll be posting more both here and there unless politics gets in the way.

But for now it's time to keep moving.

Just keep moving.

afternoon update - So I guess I was getting just a little sad about the week nearing its end but something snapped me out of it quick. I decided to take a walk because shouldn't a girl visiting Paris be able to say she took a walk on the Left Bank and saw the Eiffel Tower? But that sight isn't what did it. About halfway to the Eiffel I looked up and saw something that all but bought tears to my eyes, the Sennelier store, which just happens to be celebrating its 125^th anniversary. About $200 in paints and shipping later I was in an awesome mood. 

Observations from le Voyage 8.22

The Palais du Louvre, Musée du Louvre, Musée Napoléon, the Louvre Museum or the Louvre, it has gone by many names over the years. Its history goes back to a 12^th century fortress still visible in the basement and the Lower Hall where the vaulted ceiling is all that remains of the complex's origins. On August 10, 1793, in the midst of the French Revolution and by decree of the revolutionary National Assembly the Louvre first opened as a museum. The Holy Grail of art historians was born.

Currently the Louvre is home to almost 400,000 works of art of which it shows 35,000 at any given time in its 750,000 square feet of public displays. The museum is divided into eight curatorial departments; Egyptian antiquities, Near Eastern antiquities, Greek, Etruscan, and Roman antiquities, Islamic art, Sculpture, Decorative arts, Prints and drawings, and Painting. The Painting department alone has twelve curators and 7,500 works.

I could spend weeks in the Louvre and never leave but I have probably have one or two visits so I have a must see list. In no particular order it includes The Aphrodite of Milos (Venus de Milo), Antonio Canova's Psyche Revived by Cupid's Kiss, Michelangelo's Dying Slave, Jacques-Louis David's The Death of Marat (Marat Assassiné), Raphael's Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione, and as much of the Italian Renaissance collection as I can possibly see. Yes the Italian collection would include Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa.

Today I visit my Holy Grail.

A little bit of mind boggling trivia before I finish. Admittedly it is from a mind easily boggled by art and history trivia. As large as the museum complex is it could be so much larger. The Tuileries Palace once closed the west end of the Louvre courtyard which now is open to the Tuileries Gardens. Eventually a wing of the Louvre connected the two and both the Tuileries and the Louvre were to be included in the museum. The Tuileries Palace was destroyed in 1871 by a fire set by anarchists during the rise of the Paris Commune after France's loss in the Franco-Prussian War. The fire also destroyed the Louvre Library. Recently there has actually been talk of rebuilding the Tuileries at an estimated cost of $380 million.

Observations from le Voyage 8.21

It may say just a little too much about the sad state of American education but I have actually met a person who thought Paris was named for Paris Hilton. It fact it is in all likelihood named for the Gaulic Parisii tribe who inhabited the area when it was conquered by Julius Caesar. Another version has Caesar naming it after the Trojan Prince who fell in love with Helen precipitating the Trojan War. Caesar was fond of thinking he was Paris reincarnated, presumably after too much wine. Than there is Paris' nickname, The City of Lights. This has nothing to do with real lights but to Paris being the main center of learning during the Age of Enlightenment.

One of my favorite times of day is early morning starting just before dawn. It makes no difference if I was up or night or not. It may be the only time of day that I love color, the play between the last ebbs of the night and the first rays of the sunrise making a seamless transition. On the flight over I tried to get some sleep because I had been up all day, driving, and knew once I arrived there would be no sleeping. I did manage to doze off but about four hours into the flight (about 2AM New York time) I opened my eyes to one of the most stunning sunrises I have ever seen, including on Kauai. The same play of light and color I just mentioned with the added effect of being 30,000 feet above the Atlantic. It was gorgeous but I totally should have closed the blind because that was about it for sleeping, time for those free drinks the Air France stewardesses were kind enough to supply.

I'm staying in a small hotel on the Rue Cujas in the Latin Quarter, between the Sorbonne and the the Luxembourg Gardens.  Being used to New York I find it so cute that because the hotel is small they lock the door at night and you have to wait for the concierge to unlock the door, something he than apologizes for twenty times. Two other sweet things about the hotel are that the bed has lots of pillows and the wireless internet surprisingly is fast as hell.

When I got into my room one of the first things I did, after I connected my comp, was turn on the TV because it's just what I always do. Thing is I flew over 3,000 and the first thing I see on said TV was effing Paul Ryan and his mom. I could rationalize seeing Willard here because he hid from the Vietnam War in his family's chateau in France but Petey Ryan? The Repubes' head gym rat? To purge that from my mind I watched the first episode of Weeds in French. I always wanted to watch Weeds and I own the first and second season DVDs but somehow southern California women selling weed in French doesn't cut it. I'm going to have to watch episode one in English as soon as I get back.

And why the hell is it 90° here? I packed leather jackets!

Observations from the Window 8.17

This is going to be a pretty messy post because I'm going to throw together a few I have started in an effort to clean up a little before my trip which begins in about 24 hours.

I had some things I wanted to write about before my trip if I had time. As always my mind wanders constantly and has been totally into the Olympics of late. Politics seems to be on the back burner for now more because I'm so tired of the endless fighting that leads nowhere than any other reason. If the Democratic Party is smart it will call the GOP bluff and let them take the country over that proverbial cliff at the end of the year. But there is plenty of time to talk about that when the November election gets closer.

Before I get into anything else I have a major announcement to make. Truth be told I forget what the hell I wrote that for or what the announcement was so it couldn't have been all that major and was probably a wonderfully sarcastic remark. The only announcement I have tonight is that I still don't have my passport. I'm going to have to get up early and drive to my dad's than drive right back to the Village which makes my Saturday itinerary New York, Pennsylvania, New York, Paris. Sweet jesus.

It's a strange feeling when you have a dream and that dream is about to come true, even if it is only partly coming true. In my dream I only have a one way ticket to Paris. Still the first time I stand by I. M. Pei's
Pyramide du Louvre and look at the museum itself, well,
all bets are off.

To me Paris has always been as much about Hemingway as about art. You might wonder why I of all people  have an obsession with Hemingway, well it's time you knew. When I was little, yes I was little once, my parents read to me every night but I didn't get Dr. Seuss like most children. My mom would read everything from Shakespeare to Dumas but my dad would always pull out his favorite author, Hemingway. Like many things I blame on my dad Hemingway became my favorite author too but somehow I just seem to relate to Hemingway. I'll finish with one of my favorite stories because in the same situation I would probably think the same thing he did.

In 1846 a monster hurricane assaulted Key West and pushed so much sand ashore it seemed to move the Key West Lighthouse inland. Many years later Hemingway bought a house in the shadow of the lighthouse and direct sight of Sloppy Joe's which was his favorite drinking establishment. "As long as I can see that beacon," Hemingway once said, "I'll always be able to find my way home."

Like I said, I can relate.

Observations from the Window 8.16

At times I may mentioned horoscopes because I have a fondness for them, not that I live my life by them, I just like horoscopes. Seriously, they are often dead on so shoot me if you must. This isn't about my horoscope though but about dreams. Some people actually believe you can predict your life by interpreting your dreams. Thankfully I was never one of them because that's just crazy. My lack of belief in dreams may be a result of my lack of dreams which  may be because of my lack of sleep, or maybe my non-lack of alcohol and caffeine. I'm not a doctor so I wont get into why I don't dream.

The thing is with my big trip coming up Saturday I don't want to take any chances so when I actually had a dream last night I was forced to act on it. It was a simple dream of which I remember little but I do remember I had a pink pillowcase on my bed. I have so many pillows on my bed you could drown in them but they all have black pillowcases so I was forced to buy a pink one today and to be safer I bought another pillow too. This means I have a virgin pillow with pink pillowcase on my bed as I write this. That is too weird, but than so am I.

My flight to Paris leaves JFK at 10 PM Saturday night and today I made a discovery that has far reaching implications for my time until than. JFK is in New York which is good because I am in New York along with my tickets and semi-packed luggage. This is all good. What i discovered today is that my passport is NOT in New York it is in central Pennsylvania. This is not good, this is bad. As a matter of fact it is very very bad. At this point I can't even trust FedEx so I'm going to have to take Foxy on a road trip sometime before Saturday night. Maybe I should have bought pink sheets too.

Less than 48 hours now, stay tuned.

Observations from the Window 8.1

I love to fly and I always have but its been a long time since I flew anywhere let alone a flight the length of JFK to Paris. I thought this would set some kind of record for me but the close to 8 hour flight time to Paris is still an hour short of the 9 hours from Chicago to Honolulu. When I think back that trip seems like an entirely different life but it did land me on Kee Beach on Kauai, still what I think is the closest this planet gets to perfect. Getting back to this life, due to the crazed world of time zones this flight is still going to be something totally new to me. As of now I'll be leaving JFK around 10PM and arriving at Charles de Gaulle around 10AM the next day. According to the Air France website "hot and cold drinks, with or without alcohol, are served."
Without alcohol? Seriously? Why?

I'll be staying in the Montparnasse area of Paris close to where Ernst Hemingway rented an apartment on the Rue du Cardinal Lemoine and about a thirty minute walk to The Louvre. I'm going to load A Movable Feast on my netbook and maybe see if I can find some of the spots. I don't expect to run into Hemingway's ghost but if I should I have plenty of questions to ask him about his years in Paris but also about his third wife the journalist Martha Gellhorn. Still if I don't see him I'd be perfectly happy to run into his very much living great-granddaughter Dree, that would work for me too.

At the turn and early part of the 20^th century the Montparnasse was the heart and soul of artistic Paris. A list of its more famous inhabitants includes not only Hemingway but Pablo Picasso, Marc Chagall, Jacques Lipchitz, Ezra Pound, Salvador Dalí, Henri Matisse, and F. Scott Fitzgerald. The Montparnasse and its cafes was also the social center of the large American expatriate community in Paris of which Hemingway wrote so much. Marc Chagall said he had gone to Montparnasse because at the time "The sun of Art then shone only on Paris." Living in the Village it may seem strange but at times I think the same thing.

For now beyond that I haven't made any major plans. Work, walk, shop, walk to the Louvre, and try not to look too out of my element doing it. The shopping may be a major plan because I'm not quite sure how I'm going to get anything. I toyed with the idea of taking an empty bag but with the Paris weather all over the place, 60° one day and 75° the next, I have no idea what to pack.

Finally, a friend sent me this video, totally gets me in the mood ....

Paris In Motion (Part I) from Mayeul Akpovi on Vimeo.

Soundtrack: Angel - Massive Attack, Mezzanine (awesome tune)
Mayeul Akpovi Photographies - facebook
© July 2012