Wednesday, April 1, 2009

The Fine Art: Degrees of


Synopsis: Evan and Shama get more culture than cottage cheese! Art, art, and more art! From the modern to the classics, these two time-travel around Paris and find out what the "Royal Treatment" really means in Versailles. They really "canvass" the area!

Is anyone else getting sick of this style of posting? Or is it just me? Man, I just want to talk about Paris, and make it interesting. I want to be able to look back on these entries and say, "Wow. I really did that. I saw all this neat stuff."

Maybe that's why people create art. To remember.

What I remember is going to the Pompidou Centre first, and seeing the Alexander Calder exhibit. It was more than fabulous. It was downright entertaining. I am consistently amazed by artists and their ability to make something out of nothing -- in Calder's case, it was making sculptures from wire. I know it might not sound any more interesting than looking at a closet full of cheap hangers, but it was magical. The center itself was pretty nifty too, although it reminded me of a cross between a giant hamster tube and Pee-Wee's Playhouse.

From there, we took a train out to Versailles. Painters and sculptors must have made a killing off of the royal ego. I don't know much about art, but I know that I saw a LOT of it here. How to describe Versailles? In a word: Decadent. My only prior knowledge of it (sad to say) is from Sofia Coppola's (blech) movie, "Marie Antoinette" (BLEEECCCH). I knew it would be grand and stuff, but I wasn't prepared to walk through golden gates, or stroll the ultimate backyard, or wander through rooms that I thought only existed in Merchant Ivory films. I swear, I thought those movies embellished the luxury. Not so, not so.

On our way back, we decided that we needed to go to The Louvre, because, well, it's The Louvre. The whole day felt a little like a fairy tale -- a palace, the journey, the people -- I even met a knight in shining armor.

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