When we woke up this morning, it was rainy and cloudy and generally “blech” outside.  So, what do you do when you’re on vacation and it’s yucky outside?  If you’re Juli, then you go to a museum!  You get to spend some time inside out of the rain and you feel like you’re making good use of your time in Paris, getting some “cul-chah” while looking at some artsy-fartsy.

We started the day with breakfast in the apartment – baguette with jam, some yogurt and a glass of juice.  First of all, if you have never eaten a fresh, warm baguette in France, then you have never eaten a real baguette.  Gently crispy on the outside, light and airy on the inside, it is so good.  And it costs the equivalent of a dollar.  Let’s compare this with a “baguette” in the US.  Hard/crunchy, shreds the roof of your mouth, chewy instead of airy on the inside, and costs, what, 3 dollars or something.  Yes, I am a food snob and, yes, I’m sure my brother is reading this and rolling his eyes right now.

Anyway, to get back to the artsy-fartsy.  We debated between the Louvre and the Pompidou Center for a few minutes this morning and then decided to go to the Pompidou because 1) the Louvre seems awfully intidimating and 2) we can walk to the Pompidou from our apartment.  So off to the Pompidou.

The Pompidou Center was built in the 1970s and was the subject of much controversy from the beginning.  First of all, the architects were chosen via competition, and this was the first time that international architects were allowed to participate in a French architectural design competition.  Not only that, the architects who won were NOT FRENCH.  Scandale!  Well, that was only the first scandal, because if you have ever seen the building, you will understand the real scandal.  Here’s a view of the Pompidou Center from down the street:

And here’s a view from the plaza in front of the Pompidou Center:

That worm-looking thing going up the side of the building is the public escalator of the museum.

This is a building where you either love it or hate it.  The genius of the building is that the insides are on the outside.  This means that the mechanical ducts, plumbing, circulation (stairs, escalators, elevators) are all on the outside of the building.  This design frees up the interior of the building completely so that the entire interior can be devoted to gallery spaces for the art, putting the guts of the building on the outside of the building.  Some people consider these exposed guts to be an eyesore, and some consider them to be art in themselves.  For me, I’ve gotta tell you that I love the design in theory, but there are a lot of horizontal surfaces on the outside of the building as a result, and let’s just say that there are lot of pigeons who live around the museum.  And the escalator “tubes” are clear and horizontal or nearly so.  So you can see through the roof above.  With its decorations of pigeon poop.

Anyhoo, we saw some interesting contemporary art today – 1960s to present – Warhol, Kandinsky, Rothko, a bunch of people I’ve never heard of…  I’m pretty open when it comes to contemporary art, so I loved it.  There were some pieces that made me say, “Um, okay, whatever,” but for the most part, I enjoyed it.  Below are some of my favorite pieces.  And I can share these with you because, in France, it’s oddly okay to take photos of art in museums as long as you don’t use a flash.

Here’s a piece of art with a grouping of fluorescent signs all hanging together.  There was something very calming about this art.

Okay.  This next artist is known for painting extracted images of ordinary things on walls.

I’m going to reproduce this on the wall in our basement rec room:

And also this, just for giggles:

This is a significant piece of art where I forgot to write down the artist’s name but it’s made out of pantyhose and bean-baggish things.  I’m not quite sure what to make of it.

This was a “room of art” that you could walk into.  It was titled “Winter Garden.”

And…this is the most contemporary of art, as far as I can tell.  White-tiled interior of a shipping container with a large image of a skull with magnificient lighting.

 

 

And by far, my favorite part of the museum exhibition, was the architecture portion.  Surprise!

In 2000, I interviewed for a job in Porto, Portugal with an architect called Eduardo Souto de Moura.   There was an entire room dedicated to him at the museum.  He’s one of my favorite architects – super-cool clean and modern design that merges the indoors with the outdoors.

I honed in on this project because it was under design when I interviewed with him and it’s now built.  It’s a soccer stadium set in a crevice in a hill.  Here’s the architectural model:

Here are a couple of sketches.  Dang!  Wish I could sketch like this!

Since my interview with Souto de Moura in 2000, he has won the Pritzker prize.  In essence, this is the Nobel prize for architecture.  I knew I had good taste when I interviewed with him.  :)