Farewell Paris ... for a while

When people say 'pack lightly' you nod and go sure, sure but in some instances I wished I'd taken that advice. The following images show the entrance/exit to my Parisian eyrie which I loved and enjoyed.
The trauma of the first trip upstairs with my case and bag and coat had faded from my mind over the two lovely weeks spent in Paris.
By the end of my time I even could get up the six floors of steep steps without stopping and learnt to 'strip off' at the bottom of the stairs rather than at the staggering top.
Needless to say in the entire time coming and going from my abode I encountered 3 human beings. The first a pleasant woman vacuuming the corridor outside my front door, a resident I thought keeping the hallway nice, we 'Bonjoured'. Then on the ground floor another woman mopping the foyer, not a resident, we 'Bonjoured' Finally a young man in a hurry who zoomed past me outside my front door on the sixth floor and completely ignored my 'Bonjour'.
There is a thesis to be written on the analysis of communication from potential or perceived political complications of the options of Parisian residential movement - for example - who gets to use the perfectly working elevator that went to my floor???????

 View from the hallway near the stairs.

Some old hippy attempts at interior decorating

A view back to my little place at the end of the corridor

View from the top of the stairs

 View down the stairs

Groovy old hand painted door

 Out the window on the top window in the spiral staircase

 Next one down

 next one down

 A view from whence one came....

 The next floor down

 Next

 Next

The ground - there was also a cellar but truly I was not prepared to go subterranean, it really looked pre C18th

 View up from the 'courtyard'

 Another angle

The charming vestibule

The vestibule and street door.

It is never really dark.

My window is the far right white dormer window in the centre of the photo.

Charming,  now imagine negotiating the previous journey in the pre dawn darkness with a rather heavy case and coat and bag. I negotiated it by doing it two floors at a time with half the stuff then re-tracing to get the other stuff. No one tells you these things. This must be a huge part of every hotel tarif - what you pay to avoid these situations. 

But I managed. It took time, I didn't risk any falls. I only wish I had found the stair light at the top of the stairs rather than the only one I knew at the base. 

 But my last evening was lovely, I took myself back to the jewellery shop I discovered on my first day and went out for dinner.

 This is from the bridge over to Ile St Louis

 From my spot at the brasseries back towards the top of Ille de la Cite - 5 minutes from my place.

 A  better view with the back of Notre Dame.

 This is south and I have yet to work out to what this dome belongs - I'll figure it out in January

 Xmas cheer on the street

 The view from the bridge across towards the Hotel de Ville

 Same view

 Xmas trees everywhere

 The northern tip of the Ille de la cite

 The street that follows the island from north to south

This magnificent medieval structure really is thrashed. However it will outlast all of us.

Paris is so far removed from anything one could experience at home that it's best just to find out for one's self the myriad of things about this city. It really is amazing. Without the language one is always on the outside. I think the locals are pretty tolerant of the many many visitors and much of the economy in the area I stayed depends on tourists.

Late Sunday - A visit to Brancusi's Studio.

 Brancusi's work and studio was gifted to France by the artist on the condition it all stay together as left by him. It was until it forced to close because of weather damage back in the 1970's. This reproduction was erected just adjacent to the Pompidou. It's wonderful. Enjoy.

Sunday afternoon on my last weekend in Paris Pt2

It's so great that you are allowed to photograph without a flash in the Pompidou. After I had had a really good look at everything on the 4th level I went back upstairs to have another look at the new hang of the permanent collection  'Modernites Plurielles'.
It only re-opened October 23. Over 1000 works by 400 artists representing 47 countries. So not a conventional chronological hang but Pierre Bonnard nowhere to be seen!

 In the first room is this lovely figure study by Sonia Delauney. I have never seen a figurative piece by her. This room also had love works by Raoul Dufy and Natalia Goncharova.
The next room had three walls with many works hung salon style. Such wonder combinations of works. Photographing them would just spoil it. There were some absolute gems.

 This study by Picasso which would be about 1906 and the next larger, later work on the opposite wall was in about the third room.

 This is a fabulous painting by Picasso, large and airy.

 So these next two photos are pathetic but it was very exciting to stand before the original hand sewn baby blanket that Sonia Delauney made for her and Robert Delauney's baby, Charles. This was just how you made things from scraps. This was in 1911 - interesting as Picasso and Braque were way into their Cubist work by 1911. She realised that this was a key way of working using choice and accident and the result was really pleasing. So they figured they would apply this method to their art materials such as paint. Fantastic. Of course the reflection of the figure with camera and all the the other reflected details means you can't see it and so you need to look it up!!!!

 This too is a bad shot but this beautiful sewn work is by Man Ray. The actual piece is very very dark made from suit scraps. It is very severe and beautiful but the digital camera adjusts for the dark tone and so impossible to capture accurately.

 Opposite in the same room are these fabulous works by Robert Delauney. they are such a joy to look at and enjoy.

 Throughout this installation are quite a few Kandinsky pieces. This is a beauty. Also in this same room begind glass was a huge and intricate installation of many many works combining Kandinsky, Klee, African pieces, photographs, works on paper, small canvases - it was like working out a huge jigsaw. So wonderful.

 It was very exciting to be in the same space as El Lissitsky's very famous Monument to the Third International! When I was there the first time it was turned on and the the cylinder, the rectangular prism, the cube and the sphere all rotated at their different speeds. Not sure when this version of it was constructed but it is beautifully made from cedar with brass screws.

This is further into the exhibition. Another composition of arum lilies this one is by Art Deco artist Tamara de Lempicka.

 Joan Miro

In the Surrealist room - had another fantastic 'salon' hang of lots of stuff - objects, drawings, small canvases just an amazing array. On this wall the work by Max Ernst - it was a much richer red was terrific. I love these pieces where he scrapes the paint on like a flower. The work below left is by him I think, not sure of the one on the right, possibly an early Yves Tanguy.

 A great monumental figure by Picasso and on the adjacent wall this work by him as well - half painted and half drawn. The lower half of the figure is ink line work with cross hatching.

 A rare landscape by Max Beckmann - his use of light is so brutal - no gentleness very tense.

This is one of the gentlest and happier works by him.

 A wonderful early work by Jackson Pollock. I love the way he used colour to cut back into the composition to define shapes. It's a really vibrant work.

 This is a work by Rufino Tamayo, The Singing Man 1950. This artist is from South America - possible Columbia. This work was great to look at.

 This is by the same artist - very very moody and wonderful.

 This work is by COBRA artist Karel Appel. I love this group's work - so wild.

Karel Appel again. COBRA stands for Copenhagen, Brussels and Amsterdam  - wild ones from the 1950's.

 This wild work is by Philipino artist Alfonse-Angel Ossorio - such a wild maximalist ! This is one for the girl who loves to use glitter and beads and blu-tac and other stuff. Go for it! You have great predecessors!

 Detail of the above work.

 Dubuffet was a great French artist who gathered quite a few of the fabulously over the top textural artists around him His surfaces are terrific and in Paris there are quite a few of his unmistakeable large white and coloured sculptures.

I love this figure painting by Dubuffet and remember the first time I saw it at school - probably as a tiny photo in Helen Gardner's Art Through the ages. no more likely in HW Janson.

 This is by Zoltan Kemeny - born 1907.  This is from 1948 and is made from thick paste, oil, nails, braid and other wild stuff.

So then on the way out a beautiful gallery with this Matisse,

 and this Picasso. The two works looked very good on adjacent walls. The Picasso is one he did when very old. I'm pretty sure I saw it in Sydney when the show of his very late works came out to the AGNSW.

 This is a wonderful work by Matisse also in the same room. It's large and magnificent.

This portrait of his daughter Marguerite was never sold by the family but was recently donated to the Pompidou by the widow of Marguerite's son who died only in the last few years. It's a lovely and loving work.