Worth Words

An afternoon in Montmarte

I spent my Saturday afternoon visiting the famous hill of the artists and Bohemians. Actually, explaining Montmartre in that last sentence is probably redundant. If any of my friends aren’t even vaguely familiar with Montmartre, well, consider yourself unfriended.

I caught the Metro to Abbesses, which is below the top of the hill. The station is the deepest in Paris, and the escalators weren’t working, so a clamber up the spiral stairs made me wonder how so many people can smoke in Paris. Montmartre, as it turned out, is awash in cigarette butts, so I assume they all have cars.

The area around Abbesses is nice enough, but not greatly different than any of the restaurant and cafe areas found in the centre of Paris. I headed (uphill) to the Musée de Montmartre, for a look at a collection of mostly lesser known drawings, posters and paintings dating to the Belle Époque. The Musée occupies the oldest house in Montmartre, and still boasts a small vineyard, albeit I suspect it’s there just to add to the vibe.

I had a most civilised coffee and cake in the garden cafe, and the weather had turned positively balmy. I’d left my apartment rugged up for an Antarctic expedition, so I performed a discreet striptease between spoonfuls of cheesecake. It’s a worry that Paris is still quite warm. I have a shipping container’s worth of thermal underwear in my suitcase, and it’s yet to have the pleasure of my nether regions. I can see myself dressing stray dogs in the Jardin des Tuileries. Today was rainy, but no colder.

The highlight of the Musée de Montmartre for me was the collection of materials related to the Chat Noir cabaret(s). I’d only vaguely heard of it, but it seems it was a wild old time at its multiple iterations. They had posters, drawings, letters and this lively oil painting which once decorated its walls:

Image Wikimedia

No mention, strangely, of Le Moulin de la Gallette and only a little on the Moulin Rouge.

It’s not exactly a grand gallery, but the peace and civility were welcome. The best Paris might yet be revealed by its small treasures.

In praise of deduction

So here’s a vaulted ceiling I came across in the Louvre. It’s in the lower levels, where the antiquities collection is displayed. I don’t remember which antiquities - I think this bit might have been the Byzantine stuff, give or take a few thousand years.

Keen students of vaultology will notice the arches are perfectly aligned. This makes the score one all on the wandering ceiling phenomena I’m dedicating the rest of my life to.

From my observations so far, I’ve deduced that laser alignment systems were invented between 1270 and 1547.

Life as a dilettante

Image Wikimedia

Saw this in the Louvre today, in a little recess tacked on to the French collection. I did a double-take, as I thought it was a Manet, and belonged elsewhere. Shows my ignorance. It’s actually Goya’s Countess del Carpio from about 1794. Check out Manet’s portraits of Bertha Morisot 80 years later. I think I have a case - I’m writing up the PhD application in another window. Still means it was out of place, but it was a highlight of a rather strained day fighting the crowds in the Louvre.

They opened a big exhibition this week on Leonardo, and the people have flocked. I wish they had flocked off, as I didn’t get the cerebral experience I was hoping for. Still, I did get to see the big Davids, including Napoleon doing a Trump at his coronation. They’re worth looking at, even if it’s just for the technical mastery. I lasted several hours, but the noise got to me. I wasn’t expecting silence, but the din was silly. I took a stroll down the Italian collection and it was more like Juventus vs. A.C. Milan, but with a worse view and no goals.

I know Goya did some very dark stuff, but the light touch in this piece has me interested. I think I need to get me to Madrid.

Sainte-Chapelle and the Conciergerie

This is when you know you’re not in Kansas anymore. The experience of entering Sainte-Chapelle is visceral. There’s nothing you can do but offer a helpless gasp. Or swear. Actually, I’ll come clean. I swore. Too loudly, but it was a gasp in spirit.

Image: Pixabay

Dating to the 13th Century, it was built to house relics from the Crusades. In the BBC series Art of France, Andrew Graham-Dixon called the Sainte-Chapelle, “...the most sublime expression of the Gothic spirit... where architecture abolishes itself ... you experience it in terms of light and colour... a gigantic light box.” Andrew can go on a bit (he goes off like a two bob watch in Episode 3 when he gets to Duchamp’s bottle rack) but he got this very right.

Adjacent is the Conciergerie, another part of what was the royal palace for several hundred years. This building became a prison, and garnered infamy for housing many of those destined for the guillotine during The Terror that was the last year or so of the French Revolution. Most notably, Marie Antoinette, the Princess Di of her day, spent her last couple of months here. It so happens there is an exhibition running on all things Madame Veto. It focussed on her celebrity, so my only takeaway was the fact that Mattel produced a Marie Antoinette Barbie doll in 2003. Insert another helpless gasp here minus the visceral.

Surrounding the exhibition was the permanent display of matters revolutionary, and this served to illustrate that Paris probably still hasn’t got over what happened. There’s nothing like 40,000 executions to put a dampener on égalité and fraternité. What happens to liberté goes without saying.

Of much more interest than a celebrity princess and slightly over-enthusiastic French revolutionaries was the ceiling. I don’t think you can go past a good vaulted ceiling, and the Conciergerie has a cracker. It’s a huge space, relatively low, and it’s decidedly liquid and sensual in appearance. See for yourself:

There was one thing that stood out to me, and I’m afraid it was a bit disturbing .

Look closely. The points of each arched rib are out of alignment. It’s as if the vaults “wander” down and across the building.

The implications are worse than you might think. I’m going to have to spend the rest of my trip checking the alignment of vaulted ceilings.

I might need to make a spreadsheet.

Cake decorating

They’re very good at the grand statement are the Parisians. Especially when it comes to architecture. Every second building is a very large scale model of the ice cream cake you had at your eight birthday, only with more swirly bits.
Got a window? Well, that will need some carved scrolls and some wrought iron. Hmm. Needs more cherubim.
Still not right.
Jean, I want to place a bulk order for gilt. Without a ‘u’.