Impressions

It's strange to be here on the internet in the middle of the day instead of as it gets dark outside, but I had a break in the constant museums and discussions, so here I am. It's still early in the morning there . . .

So, back to what I've been doing since I got here. After we finished with the cathedrals, we moved on to impressionism. (I don't know why he picked these three periods, except maybe that they're all well-represented here in Paris.) But before we got into that, we went to the Louvre to see the paintings that came just before they started-- the accepted academic art that the Impressionists were rebelling against. That was really cool, not only to contrast the two, but because I like them a lot. These are the realistic portraits and idealised mythological scenes-- all very detailed and, I think, rather beautiful. But it's amazing to compare them to the work of Monet, Renoir, and all, to see how different what they started doing was from anything else that was going on.

It was so wonderful, too, just to be in the Louvre. It's an amazing experience, really. I almost felt like I had been there before. It's a great museum-- the above-ground part used to be the palace of the French kings, and the newer underground part, which includes the four glass pyramids, was designed by I.M. Pei, who did the Symphony center in Dallas (so it almost felt like home). They even have a mall down there. I have a year-long pass, now, so Í guess I'll have to come back sometime. . .

We didn't get to spend much time there that morning though, because we had to rush off to the Musee d'Orsay to see the actual Impressionists. And that's what we did that day and the next. Each of us was assigned an artist, and we each gave a little presentation, acted as the guide through our artist's room, and answered questions about the pictures. Mine was Monet, and I was very glad, because I really liked his stuff best of all the pictures we saw. And we saw a lot of Monet, both at the Orsay and in the Musée Marmottan, where they had a lot of his waterlilies, done near the end of his life in the early 20th century.

But his paintings took on even more meaning last Saturday, when we actually saw the garden he painted in, at Giverny. We took the train there, from Gare St Lazare, which he also painted (I really like those paintings). We went down early in the morning and rented bicycles from a cafe right outside of the station in Vernon, which is the next town over. We rode the three miles to Giverny, on bicycles in the French countryside, and only got lost once, which just made for a longer ride. It was like something out of Sound of Music, only we weren't all singing. It was a beautiful day, and the country was beautiful, and the view was beautiful, and it was great. And his house! I only spent about 10 minutes in the house itself, because the gardens were so amazing. I think I took almost a whole roll of pictures. There were more different kinds of flowers there than I had even imagined existed in the world. And it smelled wonderful. And the colors! What was even more amazing was that, standing in his garden, if I took off my glasses (and my eyes are pretty bad), it looked like I was standing in the middle of one of his paintings. It was a really cool feeling. Then I went down to the water garden, and there was the pond, with the waterlilies, and the bridge, and all. I loved it.

But it's time to get to afternoon class, so I will continue later!