19 May 2015 - Musee D'Orsay did not disappoint!

Oh, the sun was beckoning us to head out early and we did have a quick stroll to the bakery and supermarket in our t-shirts...but all of the Parisians were rugged up in coats and scarves...maybe they had listened to the weather forecast!  However, it was a school morning for Annika and Luke.  Tim had set himself the challenge of walking to Sacre Coeur, a minimum of 16 kms return, if he didn't get lost, and then his plan was to come back for school work.  He set off armed with a few bananas and a baguette.

Terrific 3 D card caught our eye on the way to the bakery!

The bakeries are art galleries in themselves!

Coats, scarves and berets out in force this morning

Breakfast!

 Meanwhile, after 4 days off, Luke struggled to get back into writing and so, not surprisingly, it was an exhausting time. I set 1 PM as the limit as we had planned to walk to Musee D'Orsay, about 4 kms away and so we didn't want to waste any more time.  Not long into the walk, the blue sky faded fairly quickly into threatening clouds and we felt under dressed.  No turning back, though as Tim was still out and he had the only key!

Dog park outside a pharmacy...although we have seen dogs in all shop including food shops.

When we got to the Musee D'Orsay, the grand old railway station which now houses a wonderful Impressionist collection, the queue was snaking around the pavement and the rain started pelting.  The ever opportunistic street vendors stopped selling water bottles and started selling umbrellas!  We only queued for 1/2 hour or so and once inside, dried off and started our way around the galleries.

Musee D'Orsay - one of the wonderful HUGE clocks

The shape of the old station is well preserved

And then to the paintings....

Ah..the Monet's begin...a delight for the eyes!  Vetheuil, soleil couchant

Toulouse -Lautrec - Rousse (La Toilette)

Another Toulouse-Lautrec - I remember this and others on the walls of the GP we went to as children, Dr Thomas

Pablo Picasso- Le Beveuse d'absinthe

Toulouse-Lautrec - Moulin Rouge - apparently Annika's former ballet teacher was a dancer at the Moulin Rouge

Annika fairly quickly announced that she thought one art gallery per year was enough and Luke announced he was bored as well.  Having said that, Luke was relatively engaged in the looking up close and then looking from a distance game to see how the painters had made shadows and dimensions.  He particularly loved the miniature theatre sets for the opera house and the fantastic and very detailed model of the opera house.

Beautiful model of the Opera House

Can't get enough Monet - so peaceful and gentle

 Karl and I were distracted enough by the marvellous works of art before us not to be too fazed by the complaints.  One well known painting after another!  We reflected on the paintings of the French countryside and how we could really relate to the paintings now having been in many little villages just as depicted.  They look as deserted now as they did when painted!

Sisley - Le repos au bord du ruisseau Lisiere de bois

Monet again and the lilacs - they were all in blossom in Videix - memories of sweet perfume

Jongkind - The Seine and Notre Dame - and we've been there!!!  Love seeing old paintings of places we've seen which still exist in much the same state!

Berthe Morisot - for my second cousin, Verity, who is about to give birth!

Monet - Le Pont d'Argenteuil - This painting (a print) hung by our front door in the house in grew up in - love it!

Monet, his bridge and the water lilies...

Haystacks in the heat of summer...Monet...

And the gentle passionate Degas and his blue dancers

Degas - so beautiful

When great and famous art comes to Melbourne as a special exhibition, tickets go on sale weeks before and the tour is heavily marketted so we did feel privileged to walk by one Monet after another, and the Van Gogh's and Renoirs and Toulouse-Lautrec's!

Silhouette of Luke, Annika and Karl against the magnificent clock face - reminded us of Hugo, the movie we saw the other night.

The architecture of the original station has lent itself to lots of light and space.  The giant clock faces remain and pictures taken give a silhouetted appearance of people in the photo because of the light behind them.

Two whole galleries of van Gogh's! - Luke was looking for Starry Starry Night which is unfortunately in New York.

van Gogh - La Meridienne

van Gogh - self portrait - he really did look morose and depressed, poor man, and his teeth were terrible (hadn't noticed his teeth before)

Paul Gaugin - Tahitian ladies on the beach

 Just before we left, I noticed that we hadn't seen a couple of the rooms including paintings by Millet.  I remember, a friend, Robyn, doing a tapestry of this painting: The Gleaners.

Jean-Francois Millet - The Gleaners

And then there were the Rodin and Degas figures and other amazing statues.  The details astound me and the capturing of emotion in stone or bronze intrigues me!

We loved this sculpture by James Pradier: Sapho - complete with tortoise shell harp!

Luke was perfecting his twirling Ninja moves on the slippery marble floors every time there was space enough so eventually the kids and I started walking home.  Karl took the chance to walk to the Notre Dame as he hadn't seen it yet.  

Luke, the ever observant, noticed that one of the sculptures outside the Musee D'Orsay had a kangaroo  and so it did!  We think the six gorgeous women statues represented the continents or world regions.  It starting to rain again and we didn't tarry for long as we knew the walk ahead was at least 4 kms.

L'Oceane - Oceania - outside the Musee D'Orsay

Other continental women, each with animals and symbols of their area

We stopped at a bakery for sustenance which kept Luke going without complaint. Good ol' bakeries are located at least one per block and seem to bake all day.  My French must be terrible as they answered me in English, but I do try!

"Sustenance"