The first day went pretty much as planned: arrival and first stop at the Seine – the Latin Quarter is nice and quiet now in summer – a quick coffee at 'La Palette' opposite Lara Vincy at the Accademy. Too much sun for Deux Magots or Flore – it's already quite hot, though not as extreme as a few weeks ago, that's still coming... but 31-32°C is already plenty for me... a stroll & a roll (still from Lille) on the banks of the Seine and then off to the Metro Assemblée – where I thought I'd see if the statue in front of the Palais Bourbon might be the one I've been searching for ever since my 1950s photo search... and yes! Eureka, finally! Why didn't I realize it back then... almost 20 years ago now... So, a good start. We were then able to go to the hotel (behind N.D. de Lorette in the 9th arrondissement) and freshen up, then continued wandering (from shade to shade and through metro tunnels).
The area around Gare St. Lazare was too renovated/demolished – so we moved on to the Marais, which I know best. We bought a quiche-like tart from Manon and some cold coffee at the supermarket, and then sat down on a bench in the Place des Vosges... because it was still too hot to do too much. People-watching – that's all you need on a 'Dog Day' afternoon – after a while, We meandered along to St. Paul and took the metro towards La Défense, got off at Les Sablons and into the Bois de Boulogne... no sign of cooling down – the heat was trapped in the dry forest, Lieve was afraid it would explode into a forest fire... I wanted to see Gehry's Vuitton creation... and found it somewhat mediocre – somewhere between the Disney and Weismann Museums, but more airy... not airy enough for the surroundings, in my opinion – playful, yes, but also the question of whether it needs to be so extensive... I didn't go inside, but you can see quite a bit online, and it's very present, like elsewhere – I prefer more neutral spaces... (I'm just old-fashioned by nature...)
Anyway, through the dry forest to Porte Dauphine and by tram through the districts to Porte de Clignancourt – the social divide is very noticeable between Avenue Foch and then Château Rouge, where might imagine te be in Lagos... it used to be less grim than this time – more drug dealing than exotic markets these days, we think – anyway, some 'clochards' have become very peculiar; perhaps Flakka has gained more of a foothold in France than here. So, we athletically climbed the side staircase from the Sacre Coeur again... Lieve was already dragging herself & down on her knees, not out of piety, but because she simply couldn't go on! Too little coffee, too high a temperature, too long the distances Chris had devised to complete within specific time slots... ooof.
But then beautiful views at the top – ah, Paris! Admittedly very crowded, with various artists feeling compelled to give free concerts, but hey, it's the holidays, isn't it? (or rather, it is the holiday) – starting to feel a bit tired, we took a side street to the Bateau Lavoir and a little further down, settling down on a terrace nearby. Evening fell and the dogs need to go out – the sight of Fifi & Madame gives our beer and croquette the necessary lift and amusement until darkness falls. Then a quick visit to the Church of the Abesses and back to the metro (not quite the last metro yet, but the second to last – because we absolutely had to see the river, Place de la Concorde, and the Eiffel Tower... The Bateau Mouche applauded as we exchanged a tender pensioner's kiss on the bridge. After admiring the Montgolfière, back to the metro and home... or rather, home to our hotel, where we fell asleep quite quickly and were lucky with the lack of street noise – a perk of summer in Paris.
We slept in well and had a mediochre breakfast at the hotel – my plan had been to have petit déjeuner outside – but I saw out the window that the bakeries I'd spotted on Google were closed. Oh well, then I found a BoBo coffee shop a little further up, but it wasn't quite right either: the scone was good, but the coffee was a bit too exotic and expensive... that's the downside of summer: all the Parisians are gone. No decent regular coffee, just specialties everywhere. Anyway, back to the hotel, pack up, pay, and then on to the 'Musée de la Vie Romantique' – the real reason for the trip, since Marc R. had highly recommended it when we said goodbye at the hospital – so it was a kind of homage. A charming place, still with a touch of city-official administrative charm (instead of the glossy private museums that are everywhere these days), and interesting enough.
The former haunt and workplace as well as collection Ary Scheffer—especially with the addition of the George Sand section—is a good illustration of the then-current 'Nouvelle Athènes' where Romantic souls congregated... oh, and young Werther, among a few others... Luckily, we were early enough because it was starting to get quite crowded. The paintings in the studios weren't uninteresting, but we grew up with mediocre kitsch imitations of this era, and it's not easy to see the originals differently...
So, out we went: I had planned to take another look at the Bir Hakeim bridge—from there you can take a lovely walk along the Seine in the Eifel region—but the Quai Branly is now so full of tourist attractions that it's not the idyllic scene it once was... then back across at the Debrilly footbridge and into the Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville... the The collection is still free to visit, but this time we had bad luck: most of the rooms were closed for "accrochage". However, we enjoyed the cooled rooms and made some minor discoveries. Afterwards, we continued to the Pont d'Alma, where we had a snack on a small terrace before heading down the chic boutique street of the big brands – glittering, empty shops (Prada, Armani, Cucinelli, Dior, Sander, Valentino, etc.) with workout doormen in bursting suits along the Avenue Montaigne to the Champs-Élysées, where we went underground again and resurfaced at the Fondation Cartier at the Palais Royal. I wanted to see what Chris Dercon's new workplace looked like... (He had mentioned my gallery a few years earlier when he was still director of the Petit Palais – someone who hadn't forgotten where he had first seen his discoveries )– but this new structure in the old building opposite the The Louvre was too aloof & farfetched for me... it's probably a good way to crown one's career, but it doesn't really have much to do with art anymore... so then I went straight to the Bourse, where the Pinault Collection is now housed... another mega-project where a great building has become a showpiece – the setting more important by far than the art, although there are always some interesting pieces – in any case, we didn't have any more time, so we plunged into the Halles and headed to the train station.
