I can not believe I only have one more week in my program.

Yesterday we went to Centre Pompidou.

http://www.centrepompidou.fr/Pompidou/Accueil. Their website is really cool. You can look at over 6,000 pieces of art from their museum on line!

It is home to some of the most famous modern art. I saw pieces of art from Pablo Picasso, Otto Dix, Salvador Dali, Chagall, and Matisse among many other avant garde artists. I can’t remember my favorite artists unfortunatley.

I have no idea what this painting is

I did see this piece. It is Picasso, I am pretty sure.

this museum was really intersting to see.  The area of the museum were were was sponored by the house of Yves Saint Laurent. pretty fancy, right?

After class my friend, Tasha, and I walked around Les Halles and had lunch and a crepe…. Yes lunch AND a crepe. I have become addicted to crepes I think. If we go one or two days without a crepe, we start feining for one. Thank goodness my stay in Paris is almost over only for the sake of my figure….

Les Halles is known as “the belly of Paris”. It was developed by that “scoundrel” kind Philippe Auguste for merchants and wholesellers in 1183.  But in the 60’s the central marketplace was moved to another location but the square still remains. In the center, the Fountain de Innocents still remains. It it a meeting place for many locals.

(thank you to whoever I stole this picture from)

Les Halles is an intersting part of the City, not my favorite due to its high tourist population but it was still fun. There were more tattoo parlors in this area than in any other area of Paris. Shoe store after shoe store lined the area.  My friend really wanted to buy a gold pair of reeboks. We also joked about her getting a tatoo. Thank goodness I am not very convincing or else I think she might actually have got a tattoo.

Today we are going to the Salvador Dali museum in Montmarte!

bisous!

Before we went to the Musee Carnavalet we visited Victor Hugo’s (author of Les Miserables and Hunchback of Notre Dame, in case any one was wondering) house The house was beautiful but very dark. It was hard to get any good pictures of his house. His bedroom was especially dark, and his bed was so little. I am a pretty short girl and I don’t think I would be able to lay down completely in his tiny bed.

This is the room decorated completely in Chinese art. Victor Hugo and his peers found the east extremely exotic and alluring. This house as well as the house the Musee Carnavalet is in has one room dedicated to Asian art.

Both of these museum’s are in a really cool part of Paris. This area is where the Bastille was charged and demolished, the initial movement of the people to overthrow the royal family. The history of this area gives it a progressive feel today. This is where many of the protests in France today either begin or end.

It is home to the Opera Bastille, an eye-sore to many Parisians. It was built in 1989 and looks like a typical building you would see in America. It does not have the historical, traditional charm the other structures do.

I really don’t know what the counter-part would be in NYC to give you all a reference. My mom said SoHo but I am not quite sure.

The park in the middle of The Place des Vosages, the oldest square in Paris, was full of young mothers with their children. Actually, looking back now, they were more likely to be the children’s nannies.

I imagine the young, aristocratic Parisians live in this neighborhood. The kids of huge families starting their own families. I could be COMPLETELY off base but this is my conclusion. There was undoubtedly but discrete feeling of money and prestige with the inhabitants of this neighborhood.

The shopping was incredible. It wasn’t huge name brand stores Like Christian Dior or Prada. They were stores of smaller designers I had never heard of so I wasn’t intimidated to go into. Once I started to look through the clothes in a few boutiques I became intimidated. These clothes were great, with huge price tags. In my rainnbows, torn up jeans, patagoina fleece, and fanny pack wallet, (a typical american student in Paris, right?) I started to feel especially out of place. I wanted to buy everything and put it on in the store and shed my layer of grummy “Americanisms”.

Again, the discreteness of this neighborhood. It seems like its a small humble area but when you look closer its a hotspot for culture and art, a consequence of having such a grand history of residents.

We walked by a designer who was hand sewing wedding gowns. We were in complete awe of the dresses in the window.

After being shamed by these gorgeous people, clothes, and lifestyles we found lunch closer to the metro (the busier part of town) and had lunch on the steps of the Opera house. Which was pretty cool to me.

After seeing the girls in the neighborhood looking so Parisian and chic, I called my mom that night to send me clothes on the fly.

now I’m rambling. Its dinner time and its a girls birthday tonight. We are going to find a discotech of her choice and celebrate like the parisians do! and don’t worry Nancy, we are classy girls, but thank you for your loving advice.

On Monday we went to Musee Carnavalet. It is the museum of the City of Paris which moves through the history of Paris in a series of rooms that combine painting, sculpture, photography, city models and actual period rooms, furniture and all, which document Paris and the Parisians from medieval to modern times.

This is a scuplture of Louis the XIV, the “Sun King”. His outfit is VERY roman.

This is from a bridge that was destroyed during the Revolution

These dainty men are part of a larger painting that also got ruined during the revolution. This was the only piece of the painting that was restored. These men were VERY important and powerful in France during their time. It’s interesting how truly dainty they look. What you can’t see in these pictures is how life-like their faces are. It was actually surprising how alive they looked.

I would love to have this chaise in my house.

This room was my favorite room BY FAR. We actually only went into this room to stall while another group was in the room we were going to next. This room is a Jewelry Boutique from the early late 20th century. It was very whimsical.

These are actually locks of Marie-Antoinette’s hair! creeeeepy, right? These are pieces of jewlery with her hair. On the left is a ring with braided hair and the on the right is a locket with her hair. It is a little unsettling at first but weren’t giving locks of hair a gesture of love?

In this same museum there was a room with all the furniture from the prison Marie-Antoinette occupied at the end of her life. All though the room looked comfortable and filly to us today, it was truly a prison to Marie-Antoinette who had been living in luxury that none of us could ever imagine. It was also a prison because she was waiting to be put to death and watching her husband and children taken away from her one by one either by death or by force to another prison.

this past weekend was VERY busy.

we were studying Romanesque and Greco-Roman Paris on Friday. We stated at the OLDEST church in Paris. It was right next to Notre Dame. Notre Dame DWARFED this church in size and ornateness. It was a very simple but beautiful church. They still hold services there. I would love to go back on a Sunday for a service. I wouldn’t understand a word they were saying but it would still be be a great experience.

After the church we walked to the Louvre. On the way there we saw a production of a movie. I do not know the name of the movie but we found out that its Russian director and its about a couple during WWII. They were filming on the Seine.  I did not recognize any of the actors. But ill make sure to keep my eye out for a period movie set in Paris during the second world war!

The Louvre was AWESOME! its so big though! I have to go back when I have more time to discover.

we spent a really long time at Venus de Milo. I really find this art interesting because of my Freedom in Rome class from last semester. I could have spent HOURS just in that one wing.

I had to leave the Louvre early to get to my cinema class. I was a little disappointed to take this class at first. I didn’t want to spend my time in Paris watching movies while I could be experiencing Paris for myself. But the class actually turned out to be really interesting.

We watched “The Beat that my Hear Skipped” its about a French gangster who’s really interest is becoming a concert pianist. If it is available in the US, you should rent it!

Our first day of class was at the Musee du Moyen Age in the Latin Quarter of Paris. The museum was a gothic townhouse of the abbots of Cluny…. I have no idea what that means either.

The main feature of the museum was a set of five tapestries from medieval Paris. The tapestries were used to insulate the cold castles as well as a means to communicate with the illiterate since the only people who could read or write back then were royalty and clergy.

There tapestries were so detailed and ornate as well as very mysterious. There is not much known about their origin.

There were also MANY other pieces of art from medieval Paris.

A lot of the art was of the Virgin Mary and an infant. ALL of the art had very strong Christian themes. This one was BY FAR the chubbiest of the sculptures.

This is a comb used during that time

I just finished a class at OU called Freedom in Rome in which we studied the rise and fall of the Roman Empire so I was espeicially excited to see the ruins of the Roman baths but unfortunately they were closed for restoration. My teacher did reassure me that we would see some Roman baths.

These were the heads of statues that had been beheaded. I can not remember why the people decided to be head these particular statues. I think it has something to do with the fear that they might be kings? I definetly zone out while my teacher was explaining the significance of these statues. The restored replicas of these head are in Notre Dame which I will see next Friday and I’ll be sure to remember why they were beheaded

Alyse Marie › Edit — WordPress

But don’t worry, even amongst all of this culture and refinement in Paris, I’m still reminded of my roots often.