Globetrotting - Paris, France
By Russell Bartholomee & Lucy Bartholomee

“I love Paris in the springtime,
I love Paris in the fall,
I love Paris in the winter when it drizzles,
I love Paris in the summer when it sizzles.
I love Paris every moment, every moment of the year…"—Cole Porter

The words of the song may be a cliché, but for me they are absolutely true nevertheless (though to be honest, I’ve never really seen Paris in the fall).  There’s a good reason that Paris, France is one of the most celebrated cities in the world.  The well-named City of Lights has earned its reputation as one of the world’s cultural treasures.  At one time or another in its illustrious history, Paris has been on the cutting edge of art, music, architecture, cinema, literature, philosophy, cuisine, and, yes, even fashion.

I first fell in love with Paris when I was 15 years old and was fortunate enough to have parents who saw the value of world travel and cultural exchange.  After hosting a French student in our home, I was able to spend the better part of a summer with my French other self, a brilliant and talented Parisian named Jeremie and his incredible family.  While it was certainly their limitless hospitality that was most responsible for the amazing experience I had, it was also Paris itself, endlessly brimming with (brace for another cliché) joie de vivre.  At every turn, I saw glorious architecture (you really get a sense of history walking the streets of European cities, realizing that the American definition of an “old building” is a bit short of the mark).   Every meal was a culinary delight.  There was never any lack of things to do, see or hear.  From the jazz club where I saw Tony Williams and Ron Carter to the many world-renowned museums and monuments, my every step was steeped in art and culture.  Baltimore, Maryland was the place of my birth.  But Paris, France opened the doors to the world for me, and now that I’m more than twice the age of the eager youth I once was, I still never tire of my favorite city. 



I’ve been more than blessed to have found a wife who loves travel as much as I do (perhaps more).  We’ve made several trips to Paris over the years, and we’re always scheming to figure a way to get back.  What’s so great about Paris that it has this magnetic draw for us?  I don’t have room here to completely answer that question.  Instead, this column will be devoted to the music and art of Paris, with a bit about the city’s history and what sights you really must see.  I’ll discuss the history and music first, since that’s what I know best.  My wife, Lucy, who has a degree in art and is currently studying for her masters in humanities, has lent her expertise to the second section, which concentrates on French art—especially the Impressionists.

Sight Seeing:

First a word about the French.  It is a long-standing myth that the French are rude to tourists.  This is usually the observation of tourists who made no attempt to speak French while in France, loudly insisting on using dollars or wearing “I only eat Freedom Fries” T-shirts.  It’s simply not true.  I’ve never had anything but a good time in Paris, and I’ve found the people to be nothing but hospitable.  The trick is to make an attempt (any attempt) to speak French even if it’s only “Bonjour.  Parlez-vous anglais?  (Hello.  Do you speak English?)”  You’re a guest in their country.  It’s just good manners if you don’t speak the language to acknowledge it.  If you do, you’ll find that many Parisians are more than willing to speak whatever English they know (and it’s usually a lot).

I know it’s touristy, but unless you’re going to be living there (and especially if you’ve never been), you really must see the famous sights and monuments of Paris.  I don’t need to list all of these obvious places for you, but obvious or not, they deserve to be seen.  After all, if you come home from Paris and you didn’t bother to see the Arc de Triomphe or go to the top of the Eiffel Tower (at night, of course), you’d never forgive yourself.  On the other hand, seeing the monuments shouldn’t take up your whole trip.  So here’s what you do.  On the first full day of your stay, arrange a morning sightseeing tour.  You should be able to get help with this at the front desk, but a travel agent can book one as well.  These are generally bus tours that take you to all the major sights in a few hours.  You’ll be able to get out at key stops along the way to take pictures, and in much less time than you could hope to do on your own.  If possible, find a tour that ends at Notre Dame (more on that later).  Once the tour is over, you can always go back to the most intriguing places for a longer visit.  You will definitely want to return to the Tour Eiffel in the evening.  The tower is covered in bright, twinkling lights, and the view from the top is breathtaking.  (Don’t let your hipster friends give you any crap about doing this, either.)




Once you have the sightseeing out of the way, you can spend time soaking up the real culture of the city.  Paris is a city on a river (the Seine).  The oldest part of the city is an island in the middle of the river, L’Isle de la Cité, on which stands the imposing Cathedral of Notre Dame.  There is another, smaller island in the river, L’Isle St. Louis, which is not going to be on any guided tour.  But if you have time, you should walk across the bridge from Notre Dame to this little island, which has world class dining and some of the finest ice cream you will ever eat.  On either side of the river are the Right and Left Banks.  On the Right Bank, you will find the bulk of the famous monuments, as well as most of the best shopping (I recommend the Galleries Lafayette, if only for window shopping) in Paris.  The Left Bank is home to the Sorbonne University and the Latin Quarter, in which medieval Paris is preserved (next to a multitude of restaurants offering incredible international cuisine).




If your bus tour ended at Notre Dame, you will want to go there first, of course.  There you will see one of the best examples of Gothic architecture to be found anywhere.  Enjoy the exquisite stained glass and the expert stone caving on the front of the church.  As you leave, with the Cathedral to your back, the Right Bank (Rive. Droite) will be on your right, and the Left Bank (Rive. Gauche) on your left.  This bit of knowledge will come in handy.  But before you cross any bridges, you should explore a bit of L’Isle de la Cité.  If you walk straight out of Notre Dame’s front doors and head in that direction for a couple of blocks, you will come to the Palais de Justice.  Look carefully along the outer walls of this governmental complex and you will see an entrance to the Saint Chapelle, a tiny gothic cathedral that is one of the great hidden treasures of Paris.  You can barely see the cathedral’s spire from the outside of the Palais.  It’s absolutely worth the time and trouble to go inside this chapel, which I consider the most beautiful sight in the entire city.  The outside of the chapel is n big deal, but inside, on the second floor, is a glorious display of towering stained glass, which when sunlight streams in, is an actual religious experience.  This is not to be missed.




It’s a short walk to the Latin Quarter on the left Bank from here.  After the morning you’ve had, you’ll want a good meal.  And you’re bound to find something great to eat here.  Stroll around until you find something to your tastes.  In the meantime, enjoy the sights of medieval streets and architecture, still in use after all these centuries.

Everywhere you go in Paris, you will find cafés.  You really owe it to yourself to eat in at least one.  Be aware that most cafés offer three prices.  If you eat standing at the counter it’s cheapest.  Sitting inside is a bit more.  You’ll pay the most to be seated outside, but set aside money and time to do so.  It doesn’t have to be Fouquet’s on the Champs Elysees (though that will do nicely).  Most any café will do.  Be sure to finish with coffee, which is espresso and very good.

Music:

Paris is a musical city.  Every year on June 21 (the longest day of the year), the Parisians celebrate Fete de la Musique, an all day music party, in which every street is crammed with musicians playing every type of tune you’ve ever heard.  If you’re not there on June 21, there’s still great music to be found all over.  What follows are some recommendations.  It is by no means an exhaustive list.

Fnac




Fnac is a French music chain, with locations all around the city.  Each one is as large and well-stocked as any Virgin Megastore, with the added benefit of being an actual French-owned business.  They’ll have whatever you’re looking for, no matter where it’s from.  And while you can certainly find American and British releases, I’d like to suggest that you get at least one disc of French music.  Even if you don’t understand the language, this will be a souvenir that you’ll actually use and enjoy again and again.  You can’t go wrong with traditional fare like Edith Piaf.  But at every Fnac I’ve visited, I’ve found modern French music that fits my tastes, simply by naming bands I love and asking for recommendations from the fantastic staff.  Here are a few of my favorites:

MC Solaar.  This French rapper has a few of my favorite all-time hip hop records.  Look for Mach 6 or Prose Combat.  Recommended if you like De La Soul or Tribe Called Quest.

Dionysos. French indie rock, with heavy Pixies influence.  This is a great band that’s not at all afraid to experiment with sound.  Try Western Sous la Neige or Haiku.

Hughes Aufray. The French answer to Bob Dylan with a better voice.  Aufray even recorded an entire disc of Dylan songs in the 60s (Aufray Chante Dylan), which is very good. But any Greatest Hits disc (there are a few versions) will be good as well.  Make sure the song “Celine” is on whatever you buy.  Dylan fans will love it.

Vincent Delerm. Witty singer/songwriter who writes lyrics with wordplay worthy of Elvis Costello.  His self-titled debut is a real treat, full of quiet, quirky vocals and lovely piano arrangements.

If you want to see some live music, Paris has more great venues than you’ll have time to check out.  Here are a few sure-fire bets:

Nouveau Casino: I’ll let my friend Elise, who studied in Paris, explain the appeal of this indie club:  “It's a very high-energy place, and attracts all these bands that are either totally unknown, or pretty famous in the US (Yo La Tengo) without having attracted a huge following in France. The indie rock scene in France is so small that a club like NC won't have the same music every night; it'll have, say, an indie rock show, hardcore night, hip hop party, 60s mod party and punk rock karaoke. (Okay, maybe not the last one. Yet.)”

La Cigale is another good (and a bit larger) venue for indie bands, French and international. (Elise saw Dionysos here). 

L'Élysée Montmartre was built by Gustav Eiffel (yes, that Eiffel), and it’s one of the best places to see up and coming French rock.

Le Batofar. A tiny club that’s actually in a boat on the Seine.  Elise saw Sleater-Kinney there, and says “it rocks.  Literally.

If you like jazz, try Au Duc des Lombards, which is a bebop club with modern jazz in a dark atmosphere decorated like a Paris Metro station.

Art:

If you throw a rock in Paris (and you probably shouldn’t), you’ll probably hit an art museum.  The Pompidou houses an impressive collection of modern art, which you can also find in smaller galleries all over Paris.  Of course, the Louvre gets a lot of press, and is magnificent and an excellent destination for tourists of any ilk.  And you should of course go see the Mona Lisa, the Venus de Milo, Winged Victory, Napoleon’s apartments, and the other riches of the art world on display in the Louvre.  But if you are among the masses enchanted by Impressionism, may I direct your attention across the river and across town to two distinctive and very different buildings which house some of the world's most popular and influential paintings—live and in person.

The Musee d’Orsay

Built on the site of the Palais d’Orsay, later the site of a train station in downtown Paris, the Orsay is a fantastic museum for Impressionism.  The train station that now houses the collection was built just in time for the Universal Exhibition in 1900.  This is the same exhibition that launched the Eiffel Tower, practically a celebration of steel and rivets.

The stone facade was made to compliment the Louvre, which is just across the river.  The distinctive gilded clocks face the river and were supposed to be the only outward sign that this was a great train station.  The great nave, housing the actual railway tracks, was inspired by Roman basilicas, and was 220m long and 32m high.  It ran up to 200 trains daily, but technology changed making the tracks less desirable, and the recession of the 1930’s finally closed the station down and it sat empty for decades.

By the 1960’s, it was expected that the Gare d’Orsay would be torn down, but a preservation order passed in 1973, followed five years later by a plan to turn it into a museum.  Renovations were extensive, and it finally opened as a museum in December 1986.  The Musee d'Orsay houses all manner of works of art created from the Second Republic until World War I, 1848-1914, including paintings, drawings, sculpture, decorative arts like furniture and home wares, and architectural plans.  The remarkable thing here is that the artwork is actually housed in its own historical context.

The Orsay train station, with its high, light ceilings and steel grillwork, is in fact a uniquely appropriate place to house the 19^th century paintings and sculpture belonging to the French state.  Particular to this era is the development of industrial technology and the capitalism that drove it along, making those high steel beams possible.  Add to that the dedication that the artists and architects of the latter half of the century had to the glorification of the modern, the contemporary, and the ordinary.

Impressionism and Post Impressionism are housed on the fifth floor in a long series of small salons, most of which are hung with the work of one artist per room.  This is powerful in its communication of the artist’s overall style, technique, and themes, and allows you to contrast their stages and phases.

They have four of Monet’s paintings from the Rouen Cathedrals series displayed together, which is more powerful than any of them individually could be.  You can actually tell what the weather is, even what the time of day was, by comparing the changes in light, shadow and color.  The sunset picture in particular just glows.  Monet uses the famous patches, even blotches, of color that were so offensive to the artistic establishment of his era.  To me this is a fine example of moving past the subject matter to feature the pigment, paint, effect and observation of the artist, which is truly a step towards the abstract art that lay in the future.




Walking through these rooms gives me a greater understanding of the tension between different ideals of the artists within the movement.  Some wanted to concentrate on light waves and pigments and dedicate themselves strictly to landscapes and nature, while others wanted to confront social issues and still others the challenge of how a figure fills space.

The Van Gogh room is located between the salons for Monet and Cezanne and is a powerful contrast.  This Post-impressionist's brutal energy and emotion struck me with an almost physical force after all the ‘sweetness and light’ of Monet and Pissarro.

Van Gogh wrote to his brother Theo that he wanted chiefly to express emotion, suggesting that the subject matter was secondary to the communication of feeling.  Thus, a pair of worn out brown shoes takes on another life.  It doesn't matter that the shoe is not really composed of Van Gogh's characteristic linear markings.  Those shoes speak of hard work and tired bodies, of empty stomachs and forgotten dreams.  That message carries through the madman's frantic brushstrokes and follows you home.

The Impressionists salons are punctuated by windows that show a terrific view of Paris dominated by the Sacre Coeur atop the hill of Montmartre.  I find this to be wonderful.  You can stroll along looking at a few hundred of the world’s most famous paintings and then look across the city to the hill where many of them were created.

However, one could argue that pride of place at the Orsay has been given to the Neo-Classical artwork against which the Impressionists rebelled.  The sculpture on the entry level is stunning, but entirely representative of the 19^th century's fascination with classical Rome and Greece, while the sculpture of the Impressionists and Post-Impressionists are displayed with the paintings in the smaller spaces on the fifth floor.  The salons showing paintings on the first floor are largely of the classical style, with only a few huge Impressionist paintings (probably down there because they were just too big to fit on the walls upstairs). 

The Musee Marmottan Monet

The Marmottan is almost a secret in Paris.  It is not mentioned in many guidebooks and rarely included on prepaid tours; it is not on the way anywhere else, and it won’t be on your visitor's map.  But it houses the signature painting which inadvertently named the Impressionist movement, Monet's Impression: Sunrise, along with a few hundred other influential and important paintings and artwork, and is well worth an 80 cent subway ticket and an hour or two of your time.

The mansion was originally a country hunting lodge of the Duke of Valmy.  It was bought by the Marmottan family in 1882, and the city of Paris has spread out to embrace the once remote villa.  Jules and Paul, father and son, were both avid art collectors.  Paul eventually dedicated his private residence to also house his Napoleonic collection, and when he died he left the house and collection to the Academie des Beaux Arts as a museum.

It might have fallen completely out of the public eye but for some hefty gifts from prominent citizens.  People such as Michel Monet began to donate their collections of significant Impressionist paintings to the Marmottan from the 1950's onward.  It now houses the largest collection of Monet paintings in the world.

Additionally, the grandson of Berthe Morisot has donated more than 80 of her paintings, along with her personal collection of paintings by her friends and colleagues.  Morisot is among four female Impressionists who have recently begun to get more attention.  She was prolific in her production and promotion of the Impressionistic style, showing her work year after year with the men to much acclaim.  To me, her brushwork is exquisitely beautiful and exercises much more freedom than her male counterparts.

All in all, this small museum has more than three hundred paintings, pastels, watercolors and sculptures from the Impressionists and Post-impressionists including: Caillebotte, Carrière, Degas, Gauguin, Manet, Morisot, Pissaro, Renoir, Rodin, Sisley, and so on.  Most of them were owned by Monet and Morisot, so what you're seeing is what the masters chose to collect from their colleagues and their own products which they treasured and refused to sell.

When the French expand, they tend to go down.  The Marmottan has built a spacious gallery below ground to house larger paintings in a more modern setting.  The mansion generally has the type of living spaces you might expect.  The ground floor rooms are of moderate sizes and still feature the Napoleonic collection, Illuminations, and several neo-classical pieces.  The upper floors were bedrooms; intimate spaces that house the smaller paintings, drawings and pastels.

It's interesting that the Marmottan has wound up with this amazing collection.  I think one reason is that it was in place before the Orsay was converted to a Museum, so it was available at the time the patrons were ready to donate.  The Marmottan then gave prominence to the Impressionist paintings and clearly took good care of them, so it has continued to attract donations. 

From here, we could speculate that the Orsay has given greater emphasis to the neo-classical paintings over the Impressionist and post-Impressionist, thereby discouraging large donations.  Or perhaps it is strictly a timing issue, and now that the Orsay is open and attracting more than 2 million visitors per year, it will be the recipient of choice going forward.

The Marmottan should really get as much recognition as the Orsay where Impressionism is concerned, but it's well off the beaten path and still building a reputation to match its collection.  Of course I highly recommend both museums to anyone even remotely interested in art who can get themselves to Paris.  I also recommend finding a book that lists museums of Paris, so you can see what is available that directly fits your passions and then plan your time accordingly.

Next Month:  The Cinema and Literature of Paris, with more sights you simply must see!

http://www.marmottan.com

www.musee-orsay.fr

www.fnac.com