I am prefacing this post by saying that these Paris posts are not in chronological order...I edited all the museum photos first, so I decided to post them first.
Wanting to be cultured folk, we decided to spend a day at the Louvre, completely forgetting that sheer act of trying to view the art is a battle that takes, perseverance, skill and the patience of...well, much more patient people than we happen to be. The whole establishment is so beautiful though, that even after seeing the monstrous line we chose to press on.
I really wanted to see the sculpture gallery. And not just because that wing is usually much quieter with tour groups buzzing through only occasionally in a very quiet and efficient manner.
The summer after I graduated high school, I saved up my money for a study abroad trip to Paris with a local community college. Since I was not about to use precious summer hours to do anything remotely resembling work, I signed up for poetry and watercolor classes. During that summer I cranked out some of the worst poetry ever written in the English language including but not limited to a poem told from the perspective of the stones of Notre Dame. Yes, that was just as awful as you might imagine.
While my skills at watercolor probably rivaled my (lack of) skills in poetry writing, I did enjoy it and would escape the loud, drunk college student hostel we were staying in by coming to the Louvre and splitting my time between the Dutch masters and the sculpture wing. There are plenty of little nooks there to curl up in and think and try again and again to figure out how to draw hands correctly.
I still can't get them right.
Okay, enough reminiscing. The sculptures were still as lovely and serene as ever. This statue of Artemis is one of my favorites.
One of the many things I love about the Louvre is that the palace is just as astounding as the art contained within. Every ceiling, door, stairwell and window frame is a testament to the thousands of craftsmen that helped build it.
Excellence in marble ruffs.
My dad is pretty hard to please in the art department, but he LOVES the Winged Victory. So I tried to do it justice in photos. This is one of several that I am really happy with. In the next post I will share more of the things that caught my eye during our time here.
It's. Almost. Friday. Huzzah.