More Tuesday Morning

 


hmm also saw the madeline - a ginormous Greek Temple reproduction. Kind of silly in France, they hadn't done much to change the design at all, it was just big (huge!) and greek...shrug. Also found my way back to St. Augustin, got to see in in the sunshine, more wonderful stained glass, and this one had a lot of frescos. I almost like the frescos better the carvings all over - much more restrained and just as effective. and they were old but half-refinished, even better. Sat in the church for awhile (conveniently over a heater vent); it has been bitter cold since sunday.

did find the skate shop on the way home - but it was closed, and no rollerblades. I'm dying to have blades here, my jaw drops in envy every time i see someone with them. have found a few stores that have them online now, and will get them when i have more funds i think.... wee rollerblades :) and on suday i saw a rally and it was hmm envy-making :) it will be fun...

and the rest of the day was studio and posting 

Tuesday the 24th... kind of ramble-y

 


Most of today's excitement came in the morning - the rest was spent in studio working and producing the majority of this blog so far....

so, in the morning i set out with a mission to find a skate shop i had seen saturday evening walking around. was HARD to find a specific little store from memories of a time when i was already a little lost.... so went more monument-hopping, it was in the opera area, but i had kind of missed the other highlights in the area. So when I couldn't find the shop quickly, I headed down a street (maybe for two blocks, things here are rediculously packed together) to see the Vendome column.

I've been reading Seven Ages of Paris by Alistair Horne - a very excellent book, and it's exciting to read about things you've walked past in the very recent past, or know you can get to with all sorts of historical knowledge. On Friday night reading by the Pompidou, I was reading that a king had been assasinated... just to the east of the present Pompidou... pretty much where I was sitting. fun stuff like that. Anyway, the Vendome palace just kept popping up, so I was glad to see it.

Although... it wasn't that special, just a huge column in a plaza. Apparently the column was made from about 1300 Prussian cannons Napolean captured and melted down... you'd think i'd post a picture, but that was just a column. So this is from that plaza, they were doing restoration work on one of the facades. French construction is not as annoying as American though (although the jackhammers outside our window at 8 in the morning better stop soon, and it's concievable they will, they look almost done...), they do a great job putting attractive scaffolding up and covering it with tarps so it looks more like an art statement or even a new, modern facade. Or, in special instances, like this morning, and at the national galleries, they'll cover an area with fresh yellow pine boards - incredibly attractive :). So the picture is of that piece of French wonderfulness instead. although the column picture also had a gorgeous sky, it was a beautiful morning.... 

14th District Walk

 



Ah the futility - we only are going on four tour walks as a class, and the one today basically retraced our footsteps from last sunday. oh well, so it goes, it was interesting to see again, with a little more commentary on what we were seeing. also saw yet another corbusier building lol, a little place called the Maison Planiex on a very large road. it was kind of cool to see a buuilding that looked like it was from the 30s or 40s without being overly restored - it wasn't all that white anymore... saw the Cite de Refuge again, and the BNF at dusk and evening. Scary event - the sunken forest absolutely filled with ?sparrows? after dusk - a seriously gross number of birds flocked in there. and i like birds, alot. these were enough to sag the branches, and they kept flying across our sites for 4 or 5 minutes to keep settling (there were groundskeepers trying to shoo them away) very creepy "the birds"-like moment. 

Corbusier Sunday Part 2

 


Also saw the Maison de Brasil by Corb and Louis Costa on this campus. Headed out through an amazingly pleasant park, lots of sunday strollers, down some quaint streets to find the Ozenfant studio (by Corb). Could only see the outside, still very pleasant. Could tell it was an earlier work. Backtracked to walk up a main boulevard, all the way from the farther 16th to almost the center of the city - briefly stopped into the Paris Pantheon (Parthenon?) and saw the Bibleotheque St. Geniveve from the outside. We were hurrying to catch this play our teacher had recommended, when we decided we wouldn't make it we headed instead to the National Gallery, intending to see the last day of the Gustav Klimt exhibition... that planned scrapped due to 3-hour lines, we headed to the Pompidou Center to see the Charlotte Perriand (worked with Corbusier doing much of his fabled furniture) exhibit.

The walk there was great - went through the Tuillerie (my new favorite french word to say) garden. stopped in the huge plaza Concorde with the egyptian obelisk - more impressive then I expected, the gold pyramid on the top was very effective. The lights all came on at once as we were admiring, fantastic moment. then through the louvre courtyard to the river, abandoned the normal sidewalk to walk right by the water on the lower level. Kind of got trapped on the outside of the road by the river, had to sprint across to get back up to the normal street level, but that walk was fantastic - dusk, lights, water, hmm way to fast traffic... :) the picture isn't the best but it was one of the best parts of the day. 

Corbusier Sunday - Swiss Pavillion

 


Another sunny day to go building-hunting. Our first stop at the Maison Roche was thwarted when we found the Fondation Le Corbusier was closed on Sundays, of course. Will probably be a weekday morning thing later, maybe next week. We walked around that quiet district for awhile, shipped off to the Cite University to see the two buildings there. ..... 

Villa Savoye, La Defense, Evening

 


Ok one more post for this day - this isn't the picture i'll use, but it's a placeholder for now, i would like to write about more days :) 

Villa Savoye -2

 


My camera died while I was walking around, very disappointing, so I'll just post sketches instead. It's a very kinetic building, I wanted to keep walking up and down the ramp indefinately, fantastic shifting space. the wierd scupltures on the top are very hollow and light on the other side, meant to reflect into sunbathing and roof garden spaces, so they have a definate purpose and aren't as random as they look in the pictures. again, I'm not feeling literary enough to describe it further right now - definately something to experience in person.

lots of pictures online too if you feel like looking