61. The Day

Unimpressive fountain at the most impressive art museum...

It's here. The day that Brody has been dreading since we stomped down my Grandparents mile long ice covered driveway to head for the airport. Today is the day we see The Louvre. Every time we leave an art museum, Brody makes sure to ask "Since we went here, can we just skip the Louvre?" Before this day he spent hours coming up with ways to play hookie on the entire day. He Seriously went through all of the stages of denial when he realized that there was no way he could get out of going. The most prominent stages were Anger and Bargaining. "What if I get sick" "I'll just go get pastries with Mom while everyone else goes." "If some people want to go see the Eiffel Tower while other people go to The Louvre, I'll just go to the Eiffel Tower" and "I'm old enough to stay home alone, right? Luckily none of this had to happen, and this day, in fact, was not the worst day in Brody's life. All thanks to Aunt Anne.

As we got together under the glass pyramid with Brody sulking in the background, Anne announced that she and Brody were going to go on a scavenger hunt for the most famous paintings. Anything with Anne is fun, so Brody perked up a bit. Then she announced The Rules, and he was all in. I wasn't on their team, so I'm not sure what all the guidelines were, but the most important were a) don't look at art that isn't on the map and b) no learning. For more details see the blog Anne guest wrote here.

An hour and a half later we all met up and Brody requested MORE time to finish their hunt. I joined for the second half, but for the first, I let Rick Steves walk me through on one of his audio guides. I went to the Louvre Last summer with PMO, but didn't know anything about art. Now I'm semi pro on all things art.One of my new favorite types of art to see is the Neoclassicism. Otherwise known as Barely clothed people dying in weird ways. These pieces make me question the sanity of all artists of the time, but are also highly entertaining to look at.

 Most people go to the louvre only know ing one piece of art in there, Mona Lisa. At least that was me last summer. Before I go on, in case you have ever been mislead into thinking that the painting was average to large in size DO NOT BE DECEIVED. The thing is tinyyyy.

After walking through with Rick helping me, I still don't understand the fame of the piece. You can tell me all day about the mysterious smile or not smile, and the genius thoughts behind the colors. Sure we don't know who she is, where she came from, or what she's thinking. But I don't know that about any other paintings of people. Unless they're saints. I have those on lock. I bet most people walk straight past the 5 other Da Vinci pieces hanging right outside the Mona Lisa room. Whats wrong with those?  I really do try and understand art. But i just don't think it's going to happen.

Mom, Arden, and I also walked around the Napoleon Apartments. This is a part of the palace that wasn't turned into an art only place and has all the furniture and wall carpets that were used when Napoleon III lived there. I didn't even know this part existed! But I'm glad we saw it, because it's on the top of my Prettiest Palace list. Everything was gold and red. EVERYTHING. Especially the gold.

I even tweeted about it so all of my followers could appreciate the wealth of these people. Needless to say. I gave it a 10.

After a full day of running around the Louvre, we tried to score some free tickets to the Orsay across the street, but just missed closing time. You win this time Orsay, but we'll be back one day. To Brody's dismay we hiked all the way back home as opposed to taking the Metro. I think he dreams of having a segway for touring. Maybe if he would work a bit harder as a street performer, he'd get enough dough to afford one.