Paris perfection

Paris delivered a perfect day today.  High sixties, a light breeze, and perfectly clear skies made walking outside a treat.  Remember that fountain I showed in yesterday's post, the one with only a few people sitting near it?  Here's what it looked like today.

Click on any image to see a larger version.

Not far from this fountain stands the Musee de l'Orangerie, a museum I've repeatedly meant to visit but had not yet managed to tour.  Today, I did. 

If you're not familiar with the Orangerie, its main focus is a set of eight paintings of water lillies, the Nympheas, that Claude Monet created specifically to go there.  He painted these huge canvases after the government agreed to display them in two specially designed oval rooms in the museum.  He finished them in about a year, just a few years before he died, but he wouldn't give them up until his death.  I've seen a lot of Monet, and I quite like his work, so I was pleased to get the chance to see these paintings. 

I was not prepared, however, for how brilliant and moving they are.  Books simply cannot do them justice.  I broke the no-photo rule once with this picture, just to give you some sense of the scope of these canvases. 

I would have taken more shots, but the guards were numerous and vigilant. 

I walked and stared and studied these paintings.  Where you see bright lights, the paint is thick, the artist working relentlessly to capture exactly the right light.  I thought about the man doing the work.  He started these eight pieces at age 81 and finished them about a year later.  His eyesight was failing.  Impressionism as a movement was history.  With all of this against him, he created these amazing masterworks, canvases full of passion and light and the soul of Giverny, a place he loved. 

I've thought a lot about my writing this trip, and myself as an artist, and a great deal of thinking has left me depressed about the tiny bit I've accomplished.  Monet and the Nympheas, however, reminded me of a very simple truth:  we have no excuse for not giving it our best.  It doesn't matter how old you are, or what you've done before:  you have to do the best work you can now.  I have to do the best work I can now.

Thank you, Claude Monet, for the beautiful art and the inspiration. 

The Orangerie also contains the many paintings that were the collection of Paul Guillaume.  I particularly enjoyed his large set of Renoir canvases, many of which I had never seen before.  I managed to sneak a shot of this one, which I loved. 

The third exhibit on display was a large selection of paintings by a group of Italian artists known as the Macchiaioli.  The term began with critics, who used it to denounce their work as unfinished sketches, but the artists appropriated it for themselves.  They worked in the second half of the 1800s and departed from the norms of their time by painting outdoors a great deal.  I had known nothing about them before, but I very much enjoyed their work.  I'll be on the lookout for more paintings from such artists as Giovanni Fattori and Giuseppe Abbati. 

Outside, a few clouds were gathering, but the day was still gorgeous.  Cleopatra's Needle gleamed in the daylight, but for some reason this shot made it look ominous against some dark clouds. 

It was a perfect day for walking, so down the gardens I went.  This statue, The Muse by A. Burganov, caught my fancy. 

The gardens screamed spring and were stunning.

Near the end of the gardens, children sat on the grass and watched a Punch and Judy show in this nearly hidden little theater.

To top off the day, dinner was a return to Restaurant Guy Savoy for a truly remarkable meal that featured numerous delicious courses and service so good that other restaurants would be wise to hire the staff as trainers. 

I could not have asked for a more perfect day in Paris. 

Paris perfection: Musee d'Orsay and Restaurant Guy Savoy

I'm sleeping a lot here, incredible amounts, ten or eleven hours a night, and still I'm tired, still I'm processing stress dreams over and over and over.  I figure this is all to the good, but I'm rather tired of it and ready for my psyche to get over itself.  Of course, the fact that I'm impatient with myself about the speed at which I'm destressing probably says a great deal about me.

On the walk to the museum today, I couldn't help but notice this woman striding speedily in front of me.

As always, click on the image for a larger version.

Note the shoes:  Yes, she walking at high speed on the uneven sidewalks of Paris in turquoise suede Louboutin boots with stiletto heels.  An amazing--and amazingly expensive--feat.

The Musee d'Orsay is my favorite museum, so going to it again was like visiting with an old, dear friend you haven't seen in entirely too long.  I should hasten to add that I know it's not the best overall museum, nor the one with the largest collection of anything, nor the grandest; it is simply the one I fell in love with when I first visited it and have fallen in love with again on each and every visit.

As I did today.  A snack in the stunning restaurant, a slow wander through the amazing Impressionist collection, and then my traditional pilgrimage to the small but stirring set of Van Gogh pieces.  Its Starry Night is not the one most people think of when they visualize the Van Gogh painting of that name, but it is a version that I love, one that up close vividly makes clear the passion with which Van Gogh was painting, the thick strokes and layers of paint, the simplicity of the brilliant image construction, and the power of his art. 

Dinner was at the Michelin three-star Restaurant Guy Savoy. I'd eaten some years ago at the Las Vegas restaurant of the same name, and though the meal was excellent, it was not quite up to that of its down-the-strip competitor, Joel Robuchon.  I'd heard from many people, however, that the Paris restaurant was another thing entirely.

Wow, were they right.

The tasting menu this evening was exceptional, the kitchen executed it flawlessly, and the service, led by Hubert, was superb.  This was a world-class dinner.  The food blended classical French techniques, with amazing sauces on almost every course, with a playful inventiveness that always kept in mind the spring season to which the menu was a tribute. For example, this lobster dish

evoked mist rolling off the sea in the morning, and then was utterly delicious.  

I could go on and on, but it's rather late here, so I'll leave it at this:  If you're willing to pop for the price, which is considerable, visit Restaurant Guy Savoy, choose the largest tasting menu you can afford, and prepare to enjoy one of the great meals available anywhere.