France

Paris5

Today, now what did we do...ah yes I remember, but perhaps I had better start with yesterday, as this has eventuted to be a two day blogfest.

We arose at sparrow fart and dashed by tube to the new Quai Branly, the anthropological arts museum that features some ceiling murals by Aboriginal artists. These are not in the museum part, but the offices, but they are pretty much visible from the street outside, particualrly at night I believe.We had to walk quite a distance along the Seine to get to the Musee because it is beween two Metro stations, in fact it is not far at all from the base of Le Tour Eifell (sp?). (Oddly enough Halle St Pierre is is steel, and made as markets by a student of Eifell's, perhaps it is possible to see his influence in a couple of the iron motifs).

Anyway, the Branly is a fairly radical design, made so by a long and narrow block of land, space being it seems at a premium in Paris and most of the tired old cities of Europe.(It is fun (as we did today) to catch a bus past the bourgeois areas of Chantilly past a high walled villa with an acre of tree studded grounds, and feel rather sorry for them at being so cramped and without a tennis court.)

Alors, Branly begins with a sort of snail shell up winding section , quite a winding ramp studded with light projections of more or less meaningful aphorisms such as "the finger pointing to the moon, is not the moon" and Wittgenstinian acrostics more or less obscure.Infact, as Basho knew, the moon is not the moon either, but I left well enough alone on that point.

When one has wended ones way up- the ramp the long thin museum begins and the exhibits are marvellous and very well displayed. truly excellent qulity Oceanic and Asian, African and American tribal arts as good as you will see anywhere I think, more and better where France had a strong colonial or missionary presence in the 19th and earlier centuries, so not much from India for instance or Australia, but what there is is pretty good stuff, in fact they have a bark by Wandjuk on display that is very similar to the one I rescued from under the sink at a school in Balmain years ago.

The place is only wide enough for four or five showcases, but these are very dramatically displayed, and a winding wall, which serves also as a bench, is recessed frequently with audiovisual touch screens, so it is pleasing to rest for a moment and plunge a little deeper into the subject. Indeed, this is the best use of audiovisuals I have encountered, nothing much is flashy or showy for its own sake, but has the oeverarching purpose of providing useful and fast information. Many of the audiovisiual museums in Australia are designed to shut children up I think, encouraging the visitor to press buttons, but not really providing useful information easily.This is not audiovisuals that dumb down, mostly in Australia, they are.

Not only do they have these bench screens, but many larger kiosks that fit it between six and ten people comfortably with wides screen panoramic videos of tribal ceremonies, all with excellent sound systems, the next best thing I guess, to being thre. The sound is never too loud, but is a constant accompianament to the visit, insturments clicking, chanting, singing, lively stuff.

This narrow section must also be slightly sloped, because one eventually finds oneself on the upper level and walking back the way one arrived. 

So, a fine building, beautiful objects and excellent educational displays, not authoratative, but mostly simply letting the peoples of the world speak for themselves.Like that famous book the Patterns that Connect however, the viewer can easily draw certain Jungian connections, that are I think a hidden sub text to the museum...have not yet read any comments on its semiotics, so am interested to hear what the brains think of it.

The exterior is pretty amazing also, one section of the facade is completely covered with growing plants, the windows are just vacancies in the vertical living carpet of rainforest mosses and small shrubs. I guess they got the idea from Geoff Koons' famous puppy...any way, it works, looks great, although if it were in England the health and safety nazis would stop it, as there is a small amount of water that runs from it over the footpath.

Inside, I turned around to discover my counterpart from Bathurst Richard Perram! I said in my best French accent "Richard, qu'est-ce tu fais a Paris?" He was equally amazed by the co-incidence...small world indeed.

That visit took all day, we walked back under the Eifell Tower and we just had a cheap meal in the cafe below our flat and I was in bed by 9 pm for the first time in many years.

Today we left early, tired of museums, so we got a RER train out of town to that medieval walled town out of Chantilly called if I remember rightly Senli. Lovely 12th century cathedral, which had bits modelled on St Denis, and in its turn influenced parts of Chartres. It had suffered the odd fire, but the restorations were very good, and the most recent was in 1508, also a good amount of the original had survived, including the stained glass, which though not exceptional gives a very nice clear light filled interior.

Nice little town, now a bourgeois enclave, many travelling for an hour each way into Paris to work. I was pleased to find that it was not as hilly as many of these medieval towns, although it did have a complete wall around the centre of town.Quite a lot of interesting buildings, and four museums, which we avoided I am pleased to say, as we are going heavily museum wards tomorrow.We saw a lot of good things, including the house where Marshall Fochs drew up the terms of the Armistice in 1918.

We then bussed back to Chantilly, wal;ked through a small forest park to the race track with the Princely Chateau and Stables attendant. I suppose that is one of the top race courses in the wolrd, I think I have seen it on telly. Certainly there were a lot of racehorses wandering around the nearby paddocks. I don't know if French horses are any good, but if Delacroix is any guide, they are tres vicieux and must be nearly impossible to ride, as they ambulate by putting their two front feet in the air at once. They also eat lions, so I think I prefer to walk.

Then, into the metro for three or four stops to some obsucre English bookshop Caro had heard about called Tea and Tattered Pages, as she had run out of books. I was clever enough to bring books that are so "heavy" they take months to read..(Ted Huges translation of the Orestes and other Aeschyllus on the cursed house of Artreus, Eco's Kant and the Platypus...well at least I though they would take months, I have nearly finished the Aeschyllus, and will buy a version of Eurpides version of the Orestes to compare the treatment. I must have reached a tragic stage in my life...I have also read Nicholai Leskov Lady Macbeth of Mitensk...anyone read Leskov, I had not heard of him, but Walter Benjamin turned me on to him via his high praise essay The Storyteller. Leskov is great!)

Caro bought a Terry Patchett.

See youse all, got to go back to cook some pasta...but I must just tell you that we had a very good lunch in Senli at the Vielle Auberge, a place speicalisng in Roti...I had a great thick Charolais steak, potatoes, herb butter, mushrooms, breadcumbed tomato..simple, but very good indeed, the staek was sprinkeled with tiny bits of cubed tomnatoes and fresh herbs, not really for taste, but more for colour. Lovely bread rolls, great service, nice patron, only spoke French so good practice.Caro had Roast Lamb chops, also very good. As we left we noticed the restaurant was an accredited member of some culinary society featuring crossed Cuirasses, very good place.

Bye for now.