28.10.10

triptych


the sainte chapelle, built by louis ix to house the relics of the passion. he paid almost three times as much for the relics as for the chapel. and judging by the magnificent stained glass windows, i'm guessing it wasn't cheap!


hotel de ville. one of my favorite buildings in paris. ornate and dramatic just as i like :)


modern art in the tuileries.

21.10.10

l'automne est arrivé!


i love when it becomes autumn and you can smell it in the air.  happy fall!  : )

20.10.10

maintenon

on the way back to paris from chartres we stopped in maintenon to tour the chateau de maintenon which was built for madame de maintenon, governess to louis xiv's children and later mistress to louis xiv. the chateau is rather charming and homey. unlike versailles, it's not too large and it remained a family home until the 20th century so it has a wonderful mix of furniture and art from the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. two of the rooms had the most fabulous hand-painted wallpaper which was obviously inspired by chinese art and reminded me of something james whistler would have done. it was very east meets west, which is a cliché i love in interior decoration. 







the grounds of the chateau are rather fairytale-like because of the ruins of aqueduct of maintenon that run through them.  the aqueduct was built by louis xiv to carry water from the eure river to the gardens of versailles.  the grounds with the ruins reminded me of a germain romanticist painting. the whole chateau is very romantic and, with madame de maintenon being a governess, very jane eyre : )

19.10.10

notre dame de chartres: interior

the cathedral of chartres is known for its magnificent stained glass windows.  the day before we toured the cathedral we went to the centre international de vitrail where we learned how stained glass is made.  it's a rather complicated process that was actually forgotten after the renaissance and rediscovered in the 19th century. what's really fascinating about the stained glass windows at chartres is that each one was donated by a different group of workers of the same profession and the biblical story depicted in the window usually relates to the profession.  for example, the carpenter's window tells the story of noah's ark.  also at the bottom of each window is a scene of the workers at work.  there is a window for the bakers, the butchers, the winemakers, the weavers, everyone.  it's cool because you get the sense that everyone in the town contributed to build this grand cathedral. 














obviously i took beaucoup de photos but inevitably i failed to capture the real brilliance of the cathedral.  one must go there to experience it : )

18.10.10

notre dame de chartres: exterior

i have a huge obsession with gothic architecture. it's big and dramatic and overwhelming and generally fabulous. so obviously one of my goals for the semester was to see the famous gothic cathedral of chartres. fortunately nyu sponsored a weekend trip there and gave us a tour of the cathedral. it certainly did not disappoint!


scaffolding : (





more pictures to follow...

17.10.10

dreux

this weekend i went on an overnight trip organized by nyu to chartres.  before we got to chartres we stopped in dreux to see the chapelle royale de dreux, the chapel and burial site of the royal house of orléans, founded by philippe de france, duc d’orléans and younger brother of louis xiv.  the exterior is neo-gothic and the interior is a mix of neo-gothic and neo-renaissance. it's quite pretty. 







10.10.10

normandy

on friday some friends and i decided to go to normandy.  we didn’t know exactly how to get there but we hopped on an 8:45 train and hoped for the best. the train took us to bayeux, home of the renowned bayeux tapestry, which tells the story of the norman conquest of england.  we had an hour before the bus that would take us to the cemetery arrived so we wandered through the town and found the museum that houses the tapestry.  i was very excited to see the tapestry (which is actually not a tapestry at all but embroidered linen) because i’ve studied it in nearly every history and art history class i’ve taken and it certainly did not disappoint. it’s incredibly well preserved. they must have done lots of restoration because cloth is known for its fast rate of deterioration and after nearly 1000 years the colors are still vibrant.  below is the bayeux cathedral where the tapestry was displayed to tell the story of the conquest to the illiterate medieval population.  unfortunately, we didn’t have time to go inside. 


according to the tapestry (and the highly informative audio guides at the museum), the aging king edward of england sends harold, the most powerful earl in england, to normandy to meet with william, duke of normandy to tell him that he is to succeed edward on the english throne.  on the way harold’s ship is blown off course and he lands in an inhospitable part of normandy where he is taken captive by guy de ponthieu.  with great effort, william manages to rescue harold and in gratitude harold must swear to give william his throne.  harold makes this oath and then returns to england. soon after, edward dies and harold, ignoring his promise to william, assumes the throne.  william hears of harold’s treachery and with his army invades england.  after a long and bloody battle, the normans triumph, harold is shot in the head with an arrow, and william assumes the throne of england becoming known thereafter as william the conquerer, the first king of england.  


after the museum, we took the bus to the American cemetery where we wandered around a bit before heading down to the beach in search of food because by this time it was around 2 and we hadn’t eaten since breakfast. 


most people who go to normandy rent a car and we figured out why: the cemetery and the beach are literally just the cemetery and the beach. 



there is no civilization for miles.  there weren’t even very many other tourists.




just lovely scenery, old bunkers, tombs and cows, which, after wandering around for hours on foot we considered riding to get back to town.  fortunately it didn’t come to that. we came upon a building and went inside to ask where the visitor’s center is.  here’s how it went:
me, in (broken) French: we are lost. where is the visitor’s center?
security guard: this IS the visitor’s center.
me: oh.
guard: stupid american girls. (ok he didn’t actually say that but it was implied.)
once inside we learned that there was in fact no food in the vicinity but there was the flag lowering ceremony at the cemetery by a world war ii veteran. it was quite moving. they played taps. after that we made our way to the bus stop, where we considered stealing apples from a nearby orchard but we decided the threat of french prison was greater than our hunger.  around 5:30 the bus finally came.  on the bus ride back, we met some boys who seemed to be our age who were staying in bayeux and we invited them to dinner with us.  at dinner we learned they were not college students as we had assumed but swiss high school students on a school trip!  oops! to make the situation more embarrassing their classmates and teachers showed up and they were severely reprimanded by their teachers for deserting the group with les copines de la plage (the girlfriends from the beach - us!).  by this point we decided we needed to leave so we quickly paid for our food and hurried toward the train station, laughing about our misadventures all the way back to paris : )

4.10.10

paris. fashion. week. o. m. g.

friday i went to the louvre with my european painters class. we also went on thursday. one can never spend too much time at the louvre! anyway saw this man copying one of my favorite ingres paintings. 


afterwards we went to this lovely little cafe nearby which we decided would be our regular after-louvre spot. i had a delicious quiche lorraine and felt très parisienne!


from there we walked to the tuileries where we knew the dior show was happening. it didn't take us long to find the tent. there was a crowd of the most fabulously dressed people i've ever seen. i think we got there too late to see the famous editors go in but we did see hamish bowles and kate moss!!! to be more accurate all i saw was a flurry of paparazzi and a wisp of blonde hair but still i was in her presence!


there was a group of models wearing trench coats and holding heart-shaped pink and yellow balloons that said "chic!"  before the show started they released them into the air.


one of my goals in life is to be photographed by the sartorialist and thought this would be a perfect opportunity. alas, we did not see him so we had our own photo shoot in the tuileries. i did get photographed for a german magazine called life and style though. i mostly just giggled as i attempted to strike a pose that didn't look totally awkward. it was un peu random, n'est-ce pas?

le ballet de l'opera de paris!!!!

wednesday night was basically the best night of my life because i got to see the paris opera ballet at the opera garnier which is basically the reason that i came to paris (no really...after i saw frederick wiseman's documentary la danse about the paris opera ballet i decided i absolutely had to go to paris and then it ended up working out better for my majors anyway).


the program was three ballets from the 1940s and 50s by roland petit: le rendez-vous, le loup, and le jeune homme et la morte. they were all very gene kelly, paris-after-the-war-esque aka fabulous. i wasn't blown away by the choreography but i was impressed by the way petit can evoke an atmosphere. the costumes, and the sets and the dancers of course were beautiful.


the grand foyer where everyone goes during intermission. there's also a balcony with a fabulous view of the city. what i love about the opera garnier is that, unlike most of the old buildings i've been to so far, the louvre, versailles, palais de luxembourg, it is still used for it's original function. instead of being a museum for tourists it is still a theater where ballets are performed every night.  people mill around the grand foyer during intermission just as they did in the early 1900s.



the chagall ceiling. i feel like a lot of people don't like the chagall ceiling but i think it's lovely and goes very well with the decor. the yellow part has scenes from swan lake and giselle : )



the building is just so magnificent. after the ballet my friend hillary and i stood outside staring at the facade for a long time. it was a beautiful night.