Monday, December 8, 2014

A Day At The Louvre, Or An Experiment In Boredom - France

I'm going to let you in on a dirty little secret. After all this time in Europe, we had not been to one museum. Not one! Horrible, I know. I'm just not that into art. Castles, yes. History, yes. Four hundred year old paint on canvas? Eh, not so much. Not wanting to stay completely uncultured, I dragged my little family to the Musée de Louvre, or, just the Louvre. First, you need to make sure you are saying Louvre correctly. And if you are saying it correctly, please tell me cause I have no idea how. My best guess is that you don't pronounce the R and the V is really deep in the throat. Like half a V. Loo-r-the. Maybe Loo-vrah. Or is it Loo-uh. Oh well. French isn't really my strong point. Obviously.


Louvre Paris

The day started out promising. We were greeted with bright blue skies. It was fabulous!


Paris France in the winter

I must point out here that none of my children were very excited about going to the Louvre. Matt wasn't either, but he was giving it his best attempts to convince the kids that spending the day looking at art was a good idea. My kids said more than once, "You are totally wasting this nice day inside a museum." Emphasis and disgust on the word museum. I kept trying my best to tell the kids how lucky they were to see these masterpieces. After about 20  minutes of doing my best of trying to excite them and 20 minutes of them doing their best whining and complaining, I went old school on them. "Shut your mouth and look at this priceless art. Get some friggin' culture in your life, gosh dangit." 

All smiles after that. So we started off. We went right for the big guns. First things first.


Mona Lisa

The lady, herself. Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci. One of the most famous paintings of all time. If you are going to see it yourself, keep this in mind. It's a lot smaller than you think, and there will be a huge crowd of people around it. Good luck getting a good view at it. 

Mona Lisa, check.


Louvre

I took a picture of these paintings because I just really enjoyed them. I like fruit and flowers. I am not going to pretend to know a lot about art because I don't. For me art is like, hey, that's a pretty picture. Not about subject or style or composition. Hmm, maybe I need to get some more friggin' culture.


George Washington, Louvre

Hey, I know this guy! George Washington! There was a traveling American art exhibit in the Louvre while we were there. Maybe it was there just for us. 


Louvre Palace

The Louvre Museum is ginormous and is impossible to see in one day. Unless you literally jog around it like you would at a running track. This is the beautiful ceiling of one of the wings. The Louvre used to be a palace where the French royalty resided. Once Versailles was finished the palace was no longer needed as a residence and it began the transition into public museum in 1791.

The Louvre

One of my children really enjoyed the museum and went on a hunt for all the places he could find his first name. Which is actually pretty fun if you aren't used to seeing your name on things, I guess. I'm just glad he is smiling.

angel at the Louvre

This guy, however, is NOT smiling. He looks pretty darn scary, actually. This is a close up of an "angel" on the ceiling of the golden hall we were in. Next, please.

Venus de Milo

Here is another great beauty. The Venus de Milo sculpture. It is thought to depict the greek god Aphrodite and to have been carved around 100 BC. 

Next, I want to show you the most impressive exhibit at The Louvre. I call it, This Museum is so freaking boring my cuticles hold my interest more. Are you ready?





Isn't it moving? Do you feel it stir your soul?












Wait! His cuticles are so inspiring that he has to go in for closer inspection! Breathtaking!












And the final piece! A follow up to the cuticle inspecting pieces... I give you...


Taking a Nap at The Louvre!






Real artistic genius at work here people. You're the best Alexander! (Don't hate me.)





Egytian art at the Louvre

We saw ancient Egyptian work. Look at the detail and the color. Fabulous.

Louvre

We saw great halls filled with paintings that were larger than life. (See that tiny guard sitting by the doorway?)

Louvre

We saw statues that were fabulous too.

But do you know what my family liked seeing the most?


The pyramid outside. Au revoir Musée de Louvre.

Needless to say, when I go see the Musée d'Orsay, I will probably be going alone.




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