A day with friends

Today we met with our friends Richard and Odette, and their daughter Maia, who are staying in Berlin for 3 months.  We had a nice leisurely lunch, catching up, and then spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around the Museum Insel.  This island, home of some of Berlin's most beautiful museum buildings, has been in a constant state of reconstruction and restoration since the end of the war.  And they still have a ways to go.

Vera with our friends:

Here is a facade that still has bullet marks from the war:

I love the red marble on this facade:

And I still can't resist the colors of construction, especially combined with the old buildings:

The S-Bahn is on the left; it travels right through middle of the island:

The dome of the Berliner Dom, with the Fehnsenturm in the background.

Architecture in Paris

While in Paris, I saw this beautiful church facade:

Actually, that's not really true.  On was on my way to the museum of Asian art, but when I got out of the metro, there was the museum of architecture in the Palais Chaillot, and in I went.   What they have is a large number of plaster casts of the facades of old buildings in France, some of the casts dating back to the nineteenth century, and all of them looking quite realistic.  While it was interesting to see all of the works in close up detail, the overall effect was rather bizarre, seeing all the facades jumbled together in a single space.

Plus this guy:

Paris Wrapup

Even though we are in Berlin, I still have a few more Paris things to talk about.

One of the things I love about Paris is the sheer variety of stores and storefronts that you encounter as you walk about. I don't know of any other city which sustains such a variety of seemingly marginal retail establishments; I don't know how it is possible.   I know of at least 5 different stores that sell the kind of wooden games and puzzles that I love; this time I noticed a store that sold nothing but things made out of pistachios, and, an old favorite, a store which sells only corkscrews, old and new.   And, of course, coming from a culture where bookstores are almost extinct, there is the seemingly infinite number of bookstores, devoted to anything obscure and with no air of any kind of profitability.   What a treat!

A store for very chic medical uniforms:

On one of the last days I went to see a show at the Fondation Cartier-Bresson, established by the late photographer.  The show was from the collection of Howard Greenberg; a stunning collection of prints from the 1930's onwards.   In an age of the increasing quality of photographic reproductions in books, it is wonderful to be reminded of the visual qualities of a well done silver gelatin print.  There were several by Josef Sudek and others that I loved.

No reproductions.


The stairway in the Fondation:

While I was in Montparnasse, I ended up walking through the famous cemetery.  I wanted to see the grave of Samuel Beckett, but somehow the cemetery map was upside down, which upended my sense of direction, so I couldn't find it.   (What sort of a marker would he have?)   I did see the grave of Serge Gainsbourg, who clearly has an active fan base:

And the grave of someone who was clearly about turkeys:

Another thing I saw in Montparnasse was the Jardin Atlantique.  A kind of "conceptual" garden as only the French can conceive, it was built in the 1990's above the tracks of the Montparnasse Station as part  of a large development.  Now it looks fairly decrepit, especially in winter.  Odd sorts of sculptural elements abound, as do fenced off areas where things have fallen apart one way or another.

And there was the facade that I had seen portrayed at the Park Avenue Armory show and posted a picture of.   (A facade made famous in a photograph by Andreas Gursky).

Gursky:

Armory show:

  Taken by me, it looks like this:

And here is another colorful facade of a non-famous building in Montparnasse, some sort of government building (they have those).

I also went one day to visit an exhibition at the Czech Institute.  The show was an homage to the work of the great Czech artist Jiri Kolar, primarily known for his collages  (and "crumblages").   100 different works by different artists, and I like some of them a lot.  Here is one from my iPhone:

On our last day in Paris, although it was still very cold, at least the sun came out, and people were suddenly sitting outside in cafes, even the blue-haired set:

Until the next time!