Happy Bastille Day everyone!

Since it was Bastille Day today, and therefore a holiday, we had quite short class just in the morning. We visited the Rodin museum, where the famous Thinker sculpture is located. We, of course, saw that, and also looked at the various "studies" for the different figures of his work, The Gates of Hell. By studies, I mean full-sized bronze-cast and marble-sculpted sculptures. Please realize that most of the final figures on the Gates are only about a foot or two tall, so the studies are actually greatly larger than the final pieces. Unusual, right? Well, we aw these pieces and we also saw the work of Rodin's partner, Camille Claudel. I introduce her as Rodin's partner because it is the reason that her sculptures are in the museum and because her work is often mistaken for his because they worked closely, too. This said, she is a wonderful sculptor in her own right.
I think I actually liked some of her marbles better than Rodin's. We read an article about her and Rodin, and she is especially important because she really broke tradition by sculpting as a woman, and also sculpting nudes, both male and female, which was prohibited for women studying art to do. She also does not abide by our conventional gender stereotypes that were particularly dominant around the turn of the (last) century. Instead, she portrays men as vulnerable and passive, and women as both intellectual and sexual beings. Both of these were not acceptable portrayals in art of the time, and so a lot of the opportunities Claudel recieved were because of the support and lobbying of Rodin. The whole relationship between the two was fascinating, and very cool to see their sculpture side by side.

The less fun part about today was the rain. We woke up this morning to thunder and lightning, but the rain held off until just when we got into the museum. Then it let loose and poured, and has since. We briefly went into the garden to see The Gates of Hell after looking at the other studies, and then called it a day. There were supposed to be fireworks by the Eiffel Tower but I seriously doubt they could have happened. My roomies and I had planned on going, and maybe even seeing the parade that usually heads down the Champs-Elysees, but needless to say, our plans were canceled. So we all grabbed a quick lunch and then headed back to the hotel, and then relaxed and chilled out. My roomies watched a movie while I did my required journal for today. Still have to write my final paper and turn it in by August 2. Thankfully, tomorrow looks much better weather-wise, and we will have most of the day and late evening off of class. We meet in the morning and then break until 6 pm tomorrow because of scheduling conflicts with museums. Hmm, should I visit the Musee Jacquemart-Andre, which has a Dali and El Greco show up and is quite large but expensive, or do I return to the Musee d'Orsay for a bit more impressionism? Either way, I have to push myself to do more sketches. After all, if I want to apply for the Disney artist internship program for next summer, I have to have my portfolio ready by March! And how cool would it be to have live sketches from Notre Dame or the Louvre?

Anyways, gotta start organizing and packing the clothing and books tonight. Thankfully I planned ahead (by accident. read the syllabus wrong) and have already done the readings for tomorrow. I'm excited for the Institut du Monde Arabe tomorrow! I'm beginning to really dig Islamic-inspired ornament, especially Moorish Islamic designs. I hear there are some really amazing solar lenses on  the front of the building that open and close automatically to let in more or less light. How awesome! I'll tell you how it goes tomorrow. I'll include my own photo of the thinker, although there are probably better ones if you google it. Just thought this posting needed a little color. :)

Bonsoir all!

Today, as mentioned this morning, we visited the Villa Savoye, designed by Le Corbusier, in the strange town of Poissy. It seems all of the high-rise apartment buildings attempted to half mimic Savoye, but didn't quite get it right. The house was quite different than all the photos in the art history textbooks. There was much more landscaping than I had expected, and the house itself was still somewhat in disrepair. Thankfully we had perfect weather today, so we sat on the grass in front of the villa for a student presentation before going in.

Once inside, it is almost like a maze, with an oval staircase right in front of you and rooms that have no symmetry or seeming purposeful placement as you walk in. The idea is that this is a new architecture that uses ideas from antiquity, but redefines what a building should do. Therefore there is pretty much no ornament, and the house is very simple with very clear lines and right angles, except for the previously mentioned staircase and the rounded back part of the house on the first floor. This curve was meant to be exactly the angle a car in the 1920's could turn, and the overhanging second story served as a covered driveway. The rooms were quite sparse inside, and I do wonder whether or not a lot of furniture is missing, or if it is part of the aesthetic. Because it was in decay, along with the very strict architecture, it was nearly impossible to actually imagine living there. Unlike other buildings of the time with little ornament, like the skyscrapers by architect Mies van der Rohe, this was not meant to value function over form. Indeed, looking at the kitchen, it most definitely follows form and almost completely ignores function. I know I sound quite critical of the building, and while it was certainly not my favorite style or field trip, the villa can really be appreciated in its context of the time. Le Corbusier's idea was that this was supposed to be a machine that was simple and morally purer than the houses that were popular in the preceding centuries. It was also cool to be inside a monument usually only seen in textbooks or architectural magazines.

Later today, after another lovely mid-afternoon nap, I decided I would go sit in front of Notre Dame and just sketch. I told myself I could sketch whatever I wanted and I brought all the art supplies I have with me. I did indeed do two sketches, and after each one, I looked at my watch and was stunned to see that an hour had passed by. I really have gotten used to those 3 hour studio classes at school! I didn't finish the sketch of the central portal of the Cathedral because it got too dark (I was a bit mystified. It seems that the sun never sets in Paris in the summer!) but I tried to do a looser sketch of the seine at night. Below are both of my attempts. I had a man watch me draw the river and said something lengthy in French. When I said, in French, that I don't speak very well and I didn't understand him, he asked in English, where are you from? I answered, and his only response was 'oh', looked at me for another minute and walked away.

Now this exact scenario has happened to me many times since I've been here. Why are suddenly so disinterested when I say I'm American? It's quite disheartening. I really am curious as to what they said. Anyways, I did get a thumbs up from an Asian tourist who sat and watch me on the Cathedral sketch. Haha, I love to see the responses I get while drawing in public. Some people try to discreetly pass by you twenty times, so they can peep without looking like they are peeping. There are others that can sit and watch you for who knows how long and not say a word. And then there are the groups of people (who, no matter where you go, never speak any language that you do) who horde around you, and point and ask you questions you don't understand, and drag their friends over to come see, and leave you very little personal room so actually continue working. I used to get annoyed by any response, but now I think it's kind of fun to see the reactions.

The plaza was also crazier than usual, and I realized when a parade of police cars drove by with their sirens on, that this is because it is the night before Bastille day. I've already heard plenty of caution from my professor about the crowds and chaos everywhere, so I really do hesitate to go far from the apartment tomorrow. We do, however have class in the morning, on the Right Bank, where all the chaos supposedly will be. This is a decision of my professors that I sincerely question, as she leaves us to get back home ourselves. I'm sure the party-ers in my program will be right in the craziness having a blast. I know there will be an air show tomorrow with the countries military planes flying in formation overhead. I know this because we saw (and heard) them practicing last week in the Tulieries. There is also supposed to be a big parade, and this year Africa is the theme. I heard there will be Cameroon military stuff in the parade. Between this and the end of the World Cup, there is a ton of excitement everyone here! I'm glad we'll be here for this holiday, because in a way, it almost seems to fit into my class, in terms of learning about French culture and traditions. Wow, I really am a nerd.

I'll post here my two sketches a couple photos of the house. There wasn't enough land around to get the entire exterior, so forgive the corner shot, that I thought best showed the linearity and geometry that makes the villa so distinct. One museum tomorrow and then a bit of a day off. Then the last two days we'll have really jam-packed all day classes. I can't believe I have 3 days left! But I just started feeling comfortable in this city...at least I don't go home in 3 days. Can imagine my roomies are feeling pretty nostalgic about it. Ok, I officially wrote enough for tonight. I'm not sure even I could make it through a blog post this long in one sitting. Bonsoir everyone! Happy Bastille Day in the morning!

Yesterday was a very short class day. We all woke to our first real encounter of bad weather in Paris. It was dark and raining, and there was lightning. On our schedule we had planned a walking tour of Montmartre in the afternoon, so I think all of us checked for a 'no class' email from our professor before we left in the morning. No luck. We ended up going to the Gustav Moreau museum like we had intended and called it a day after that.

The museum was one of my favorite kinds. It was the artist's house and studio for all his life, and they had a ton of his work hung everywhere on the walls. I think maybe there's some closer sense of the artist themself when you get to see their work in the place it was created. The house was very cool, with an amazing spiral staircase from one of his studios to the other (photo below). Because I had only learned about Moreau's work briefly in an intro class, I had never really thought a lot about his work, but once there, I really was quite intrigued. Like many artists' paintings, I can't quite decide when I love their work or can't stand it. What I found fascinating was his break from the normal rules of painting and his contrasting use of either line or color to depict space or details. Cool little museum. You can also see the house part that is still set up with his furniture and all. This was less interesting to me that the sketches on the wall, but it did add to the mood of the place.

Since my professor wasn't feeling well (not because of the rain...), she canceled the Montmartre part of the day and urged us to go on our own. Well, luckily, I have exactly that walk in my schedule for when my mother and brother come over! I, however, ended up coming back to the apartment and doing all the errands I really needed done, like grocery shopping and cleaning the apartment (since my roommates are mystified as to how the trash disappears from the garbage can every few days...). I ended up sketching in the evening, working on a stained-glass window drawing that took very long and I didn't get very far. I decided for on night to indulge my perfectionist self and be precise in a sketch. I'll post a photo when it's finished.

Well, that's all for my day. This morning we are going on our last fieldtrip, to Poissy. It's a pretty famous house designed by Le Corbusier, that I've learned about in many different classes in terms of modern architecture. Can't imagine it will be that long, but, we'll see...anyways, bonjour! Hope everyone has a great day! I know I will.

Well, my weekend was a little bit more relaxed than last weekend. Yesterday my friend came into Paris and we ended up walking around, shopping and talking, for about 6 hours! I think we walked all of central Paris yesterday, from the Marais to the Ile de la Cite and St. Louis, to Odeon the surrounding neighborhoods. I finally caved to my shopping addiction a little bit and bought a dress. I really want to go back to some places. A lot of the clothing I saw was really different and I hadn't seen anything like it before, so I really want to go back and maybe buy something more. After catching up on the last two years worth of information, it was already dinner time, so my friend took the train back, and I, too exhausted to eat out, went home and rested my very blistered feet. It was really great to see my friend again, though! Our friendship is to the point where we are totally comfortable around each other, no matter how often or rare that occurs, so it's just so easy to spend an afternoon with her! I was shocked when I looked at my watch and it had been like 5 hours. I feel like I really learned the neighborhoods in depth yesterday by walking around for so long.

Today added to my repertoire of Paris streets, too.  I spend the morning doing almost nothing except riding the Metro. I had intended to go to Reims this morning, spend the afternoon and return this evening. I didn't book my train tickets ahead of time because last time I did, it was chaos and I ended up loosing half of the money for the ticket and having to pay for a different train. I get to the train station, go select my train tickets on one of the ticket machines, and when I enter my credit card to pay, it says the card isn't an acceptable type of card. Yes, some American cards don't work in Paris. However, my card has worked everything else, so I'm not sure what the deal is. Of course, I next tried the actual ticket window, but since it was Sunday, and everything in France closes on Sundays, there was no one working. So I ended up just going back home so I could revise plans for the rest of my day. I ended up just taking it easy. I had a lot of fun just walking around my neighborhood and wandering down streets I hadn't been down yet. The French never cease to amaze me with their architecture, even when it's just an apartment building or small house on the side of the road. I found even more public parks, and I actually stumbled across a Boulangerie (bakery) that was open! Even the supermarket isn't open Sundays, so this was like an Oasis in the desert. I bought a baguette and came back and made myself a really fantastic egg sandwich. It reminded me of a Spanish tortilla Espanola, but I didn't intend that. It was good to have an afternoon off all to myself before I start a new week. The last week, in fact!

I've been continuing to plan out the time when my mom and brother come over, which is in 9 days! Yikes! Where did the time go? I'll be wrapping up class this week, which doesn't even seem possible! I want class like this all year. I'll have to start thinking about packing and consolidating my stuff. I've already cut back on the groceries. I'd be dishonest if I said I'll be sad to leave my roommates, but I will be sad the program is ending. After all, it's Paris! But for tonight, I will focus on what I have to do for tomorrow, like my readings. Almost through another book, so that might keep me up tonight too! I think we're heading up near Montmartre tomorrow for class. Can't wait to visit there!

Don't have any photos today, but I compiled a movie clip out of my photos showing everyone my walk to Mont Saint Michel last weekend. (I previewed it and the quality looks terrible, but I'm hoping that it's just my low bandwidth connection, not the video.)

Hope everyone has had a great weekend! Bonsoir all!

Yesterday (delayed posting)

Monet's gardens and house this morning! What can I say, they were pretty much a fairytale. They actually reminded me of Disney the way you can be totally immersed in another world. I took some photos to sketch later, since we didn't get any down time on our own. Whenever the next time is that I visit, I'll be sure to set aside time by myself to draw. The entire town looked as though it could produce Monet himself and it wouldn't be a surprise. I don't know what else to say! I can't decide whether I find Monet's waterlilies or the real thing more beautiful...

Below are some of the photos I got today. The place made me really want my nicer SLR camera, but it was good to pack light with the walking. I rested up this evening, planning my weekend out. Tomorrow I get to see an old middle school friend whom I haven't seen in two years because she goes to school in Europe now. I'm thrilled I get to see her, and it will be weird hanging out in Paris! Hoping to find a particular store tomorrow that has a bit of a background story to it. When I was really little I had this little bear that inspired my childhood nickname. Don't have any clue where I got her, or who made her. I really loved her but somehow over the years she was lost and I haven't seen her since who know when. The other day I was walking to class in the Mareilles district when I looked over and suddenly saw a store window full of bears like the one I used to have. I was totally caught off-guard and I didn't check for the name of the store, so tomorrow I'm hoping to search for it again. It was such a pleasant blast from the past! Sunday I may visit one of the famous cathedrals outside of Paris, but haven't decided on when yet. Hope you enjoy the Giverny pictures! Bonsoir everyone!

Approaching the end of the second to last week of class, we are all getting more and more tired. Right now my two roomies are asleep as is, I think, most of the program. I'm hoping to go to bed early when everyone heads out for pre-gaming celebrations. So in the meantime, as I'm not journaling or reading for class now, I will peacefully blog!

Today was the Impressionist day. We first went to the Orangerie, near the Louvre, and saw Monet's Nympheas paintings. They are part of his waterlily series, painted when he was in his eighties, and they are huge! There are four in each room, two rooms, and they really are gigantic. They are also curved, and housed in an oval room that is completely white with lots of sunlight coming in. The paintings really envelop you when you're anywhere in the room. It felt good both to see an artist's work that is so familiar and also approach it from a more academic point of view. And you know what, as an art history student, I only find the paintings more incredible than I did before! At the same museum we also saw other Impressionists, a lot of Renoir, some Cezanne, and we saw a temporary exhibition of Paul Klee's work. There weren't very many of his works in the show, but what was there seems a good representation.

Next we walked over to the Musee d'Orsay which I had been looking forward to since the beginning of the trip. It did not disappoint. I thought I had gotten over my amazement at museums, but walking into the Orsay, I was starstruck. It was like a real-life art history coffee table book! We started with Courbet's huge paintings and had two student presentations and a small lecture. I was told that these paintings were the size of history paintings, but the two we looked at were twice as big as a Delacroix or David history painting! Next we moved onto Manet, one of my favorite painters! We first talked about Luncheon on the Grass, and that was really fun because our professor encouraged us to contribute with any information we had about the painting, and there are a million little tid bits you can know about it! We also looked at Manet's other very famous painting, Olympia. This is one of my favorite paintings and the one most discussed at my art school. It was unreal to be right in front of it. I could picture myself in a bourgeoisie top hat, shocked by this painting. I could see how radical it would have been, even though now it's part of the artistic cannon. It also made me wonder whether radical artists like Manet weren't stronger instigators of women's rights than we give them credit for. After all, what is more feminist than giving a woman back her power of sight and the ability to engage a man without shame or inferiority? See why I love art yet?

Anyways, after those two museums, class was over so I hung out in the gift shop for a little while and then headed home. I didn't stay longer because I'm convinced I will go back for longer than we had another day. I want to sit and sketch! So the photos today are of one of the waterlily paintings and the ridiculous knot I tied my shoes together with when I attached them to my backpack this weekend. Finally getting around to fully unpacking...

Tomorrow we are heading on a field trip to Giverny, so I'm excited! I might stay longer and sketch if we don't get downtime. I'll tell you about it tomorrow night! Bonsoir!

I'm back to blogging in the morning again. Got up earlier just for my readers! :)
So yesterday we visited the Musee Carnavalet, which had a collection of artifacts (bits of facades, prints, furniture, etc.) that were from the destroyed buildings in the 19th century, when a man named Haussmann rebuilt and designed a lot of Paris. Unfortunately, some of the rooms we wanted to go see where closed that day for staffing reasons, but we did get to see some rooms that were recreated, which were pretty cool. The strange and odd objects were the most interesting to me. I saw this case that had old chess pieces and a tiny doll set (think size of your thumbnail) of soldiers and a drummer that said it was made for a Dauphin of France.
After the museum was my favorite part of the day, the covered passages for shopping and theatre. The first one is from 1799, and there are a bunch of them. The intimate shops and tiles floors are really quaint in that seen-it-in-an-impressionist-painting kind of way. I could have sat there all day and sketched if I could! I will most certainly go back before I leave. Along the way we also saw a famous old cafe that is still operating, and I think some of us have plans to go eat there one time. You could just feel the atmosphere that must have been there two hundred years ago when you walk through the passages!

Lastly we went to the Opera house. It was stunning! I love the colored marble, and grand staircases. We even were able to walk in and look at one of the private rooms and onto the stage. There was this hall that was gilded and had huge chandeliers that may have rivaled the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles for its sheer surprise. The whole place really made me want to own a ballgown to where there!

Anyways, that's all for yesterday. Today will be more of an Impressionism day, spanning from Courbet, Manet, and through to Monet. I'm quite excited! :)

Have a good day, all!