I have a mild fear of flying.
Mimi mocking my fear.
Arriving at Charles de Gaulle airport. (Notice guards - with guns - at top of escalator).
Metro musicians.
View from our flat.
Mimi descending stairs at flat.
But mostly we used the two person elevator. Very cool.
Desserts at a boulangerie.
Two delicious morsels.
Sainte Chapelle (no relation to Dave)
Inside St Chapelle
Mimi inside St Chapelle
A view from inside St Chapelle
Outside the Louvre (gardens)
Louvre gardens and ferris wheel
Louvre gardens - smooth against textured.
Outside Louvre gardens (a ferris wheel, a carousel and the swings!)
Louvre gardens (I liked the delicate tree against the stronger statue).
Man with beast (apparently man is bigger)
One more and two more and take it to a lunge, take it left and right and left, stomach tight.
Mimi (and other goddess) in the gardens
Perfect Parisian picture
IM Pei's glass pyramid at the entrance to the Louvre (the world's largest museum)
The tower of Babel (It seems their were representatives from every country in the world here)
We came back when it was a rare sunny day, but spent most of the day wandering the exhibits inside.
Inside the Louvre, the bottom of IM Pei's Pyramid.
Venus de Milo (There was a mob scene around Venus. All the men wanted to take pictures of their girlfriends in front of her).
Lord of the Flies.
Winged Victory of Samothrace (This headless beauty is the Greek goddess Nike; she depicts a maritime battle victory)
David holding the head of Goliath (proving size doesn't matter)
Madam Lisa Gherardini (The formal title of the painting is La Jaconda, which means 'light-hearted woman')
Manic crowds surround Lisa G
The Dying Slave (on the left, The Rebellious Slave)
I loved this sculpture; everyone was fighting in it, including the horse biting a chunk out of the screaming man.
Femme Voilee (Antonio Corradini) A delicate veil depicted in marble. Wow.
Cupid and Psyche, 1793 (The story goes that Venus, jealous of the mortal Psyche, asks her son Cupid to make Psyche fall in love with the ugliest man on earth. Cupid agrees but then succumbs to Psyche's charms).
Inside one of the Louvre's galleries
Dramatic view from a bridge on the Seine
Mimi leaning against beautiful tree
Close-up. Three seconds earlier the sky tilted and POURED down on us.
Dry and gorgeous Mimi under a tree.
Close up of tree (and me)
Porn tree.
In front of a the Musee d'Orsay
Licking myself.
Sane Mimi on the Seine (in front of Musee d'Orsay)
Inside Musee d'Orsay (a converted old train station)
Head of Goethe
Olympia (Edouard Manet, 1863). (At the time, the painting was condemned as immoral and vulgar. What shocked audiences was Olympia's confrontational gaze and the fact that the model was a known prostitute. Here she ignores the flowers presented by the servant, probably a gift from a client. Manet hated the hypocrisy of the critics who lauded old paintings of orgies and naked woman but criticized a more honest, modern take of female sexuality).
The Indolent Woman (Pierre Bonnard, 1899) (Bonnard wanted to paint the epitome of unveiled intimacy. This is a crucial work in his career - it's one of the first nudes he ever painted).
The next 3 photos are of sculptures done by three separate artists of the same elderly woman. This was created by Camille Claudel.
Auguste Rodin's version
Jules Desbois' version
L'Homme qui marche (translated: The walking man; Auguste Rodin. Intended to depict 'the very image of movement')
van Gogh, Self-portrait, Autumn 1887
van Gogh, Self-portrait, 1889 (the more disturbed he became, the more vivid and striking his paintings)
Outside Notre Dame Cathedral, front view
Mimi dodging tourists in front of Notre Dame cathedral.
In front of Notre Dame where we met a couple from Vancouver who were very happy to see us.
Rose window, inside cathedral
Side view from one of the pews in the cathedral
Front view of cathedral
View of the altar.
At the back of Notre Dame.
Entering the catacombs. Ah.
Catacombs warning.
Sign that dampened the urge to stick a cigarette in one of the skull's mouths and pretend it was singing "Hello my baby, hello my honey, hello my ragtime gaaaaal."
Death.
Mimi "I see dead people".
Did something just move?
First view of Eiffel Tower.
Mimi and the Dark Tower.
Close-up. I was suprised by the delicate detailing. Lovely.
Lisa straddling the Eiffel.
Who could turn the world on with her smile?
Who can take a nothing day and suddenly make it all seem worthwhile?
Mic Mac and Celine Dion in front of it (popular place for picnics).
Back side of Georges Pompidou Centre (houses Paris' Museum of Modern Art)
Back of GP Centre
Back of GP Centre (the iron bars criss-crossing are where the elevator travels up and down the building)
Front of Georges Pompidou Centre
Park outside the Georges.
Mimi standing alongside the Georges.
Outside the Georges (I loved the look of the metal sculpture against the old church).
Inside the Georges (Museum of Modern Art); an art installation whereby body parts in bags that are lowered up and down by a pulley system
The pulley system underneath.
Sacre Coeur from afar. I love that it looks like a painting.
In the Museum of Modern Art - Simon Hantai.
Alberto Giacometti
Jean Tinguely.
Vassily Kandinsky.
Salvador Dali.
Rene Magritte.
Alexander Calder (wire 3-D sculptures).
Otto Dix (no, this is not a cross-dressing man but a portrait of the journalist Sylvia von Harden, 1926).
Alice (by Balthus, 1933). (The view is from the mirror in which "Alice" stands. The painting is meant to be disturbing - an unromantic, clinical picture of an unattractive woman, with one disproportionately large breast. Her sexual availability is contradicted by the remote expression of her clouded eyes. Making of the painting: in a burst of impatience with the model, Balthus took the chair on which she rested her foot and flung it against the canvas. The small repaired tear is still visible in the upper right corner -although you can't see it in this photo).
Modigliani.
Auguste Chabaud. (Up close, the eyes are quite striking, leaping out of the painting at you).
Mimi in George - the posh restaurant on top of the Museum of Modern Art.
The Eiffel (taken from George). The Eiffel actually sparkles at night - its own little spectacular light show. We were surprised and charmed. It also helped that we were drunk.
Public art just outside the Georges.
Standing in front of the Arc de Triomphe.
Walking up the Arc.
Doing my Titanic impression on top of the Arc.
Very windy.
Celine. Her heart will go on.
Under the Arc's arches.
Me again.
On one of the bridges crossing the Seine. Proud icon - once thought to be a temporary eyesore - in background.
Mimi at Versailles.
Stick baby.
Sample of the sculptures throughout the palace.
Is that a ... man?
Hmmm ....
King Louis IV's bed.
Portrait of Marie-Antoinette and her children.
Napoleon's coronation. Josephine is crowned at Notre Dame.
In the Hall of Mirrors.
Lisa and Mimi in the mirrors.
One of the water sculptures in the garden.
It's raining again.
In the gardens at Versailles.
Celine Dion beside the Versailles dragon.
Mic Mac roars with the dragons.
Place des Vosges (ensemble of mansions, lined with galleries and antique shops)
At the Place des Vosges - the oldest square in Paris.
Mimi - the younger.
Pastry shop where Mimi slapped woman's hand out of her face and bought us pastries filled with chocolate.
Inside the shop. Notice the CHOCOLATE BREAD.
Chocolate shop where we spent an afternoon.
Don Mount and Regent Park in front of view from Sacre Coeur.
One of my favourite pictures of Mimi.
In front of Sacre Coeur holding coin of the cathedral bought for mamma.
Moulin Rouge. Along this road, men propositioned us and thieves banged away at motorcycle locks with their hammers.
Not sure what look Mimi was attepting here.
Ah, the elegant and noble French.
We ended most evening with some food and wine. Mostly wine. :)
Cheers.
