Continuing my story of the trip :-)

On the 15th, we got up bright and early to catch the Eurostar to Paris. Here’s a pic of the train station in London.

The train took about two hours to reach its destination. After we’d disembarked in France, we set off by foot in search of the Louvre, and it didn’t take long to find it.

My Gracious Host took this pic of me in the courtyard near the museum entrance.

Once we got inside, we discovered that admittance was free–the staff were on strike. Museum workers unite!

The interior of the place was massive, of course, so we didn’t try to see everything.

We did pay tribute to a few of the collection’s most famous pieces, like this one, and the Mona Lisa, which as you probably know is behind glass and separated from visitors some distance by a rail.

From the Louvre we walked across the Seine and found a cafe to eat.

It was mild enough that we were able to sit outside, and our waiter was very pleasant and sweet. And there I was, braced to be insulted. I guess I could have worn my cowboy hat.

After our meal, we made our way to a Metro station, and from there to the Eiffel Tower.

As I mentioned in a post I wrote before I got back, the lines to go up the tower were long and slow-moving, but the views were breathtaking. And we did get back to the train station in time to make the last Eurostar, traveling first class that time, which meant we had a gorgeous meal and complimentary champagne. A lovely end to a lovely day :-)

Turns out I didn’t have to go to England to see an English robin! Somebody who doesn’t know his birds — or doesn’t care that his clip art was of a non-native species — put one on the cover of the Spring 2007 Monroe County BOCES community education catalogue :-)

The weather was pleasant for almost the entire time I was in London. Like Wednesday, for instance. It rained a bit overnight; when I took this pic from the hotel window in the morning the streets were still wet. But it was dry during the day, and the temps were in the upper 40s to low 50s all week — plenty warm enough for walking around, and considering that we were getting a couple feet of snow back home at the same time, quite nice indeed ;-)

So. Day three.

I love Rochester and for a city this size, we have some nice museums. But needless to say it’s nothing like a world class art center like London. My Gracious Host took me to at least six museums in that city during my visit, plus the Louvre when we went to Paris.

The experience was like a gigantic art buffet. (A free buffet — London’s museums don’t have a mandatory charge for general admission.) Obviously there was no way to even taste every dish. Instead we just wandered, and if something caught my eye, or my companion’s, we’d call the other over & pause & look.

On the 14th, our first stop was the Victoria and Albert. Here’s the Dale Chihuly chandelier that hangs in the museum’s entrance dome.

There was so much to see inside that, like I said, it was obviously pointless to try to make any real sense of it. Just pause if, for instance, you notice something with a pointy tongue.

Or something else with a pointy tongue.

Pointy tongues aside, one of the things I noticed after some hours at the buffet is how art, once, was concerned so much with capturing (depicting?) moments within mythological narratives. (Including, of course, contemporaneous myths, e.g. political events.) I’m not suggesting this is an original idea, btw, nor a particularly profound one; in fact it probably says more about my own cultural orientation than any artist, living or dead. I’m so used to receiving cultural narrative via movies and television that the notion of someone actually sitting down and taking the time and energy to first imagine an event and then, god bless ’em, meticulously paint or sculpt it kind of blows my mind. It’s a commitment of such scale that it excludes frivolity pretty much by definition, doesn’t it.

It’s also all but impossible to imagine anyone doing this sort of art today. Imagine, for instance, someone deciding he was going to paint a U.S. presidential cabinet meeting when some historical decision was being made — the decision to invade Iraq, for example. Who would bother, unless in the service of irony or caricature or the hope to cast shame? And if someone did, the ensuing discussion would center on the “accuracy” of the painting — because post-photography, we expect images that feature “real” elements (in the photographic sense of real) to correspond exactly in space in time to whatever is being “represented.” So you couldn’t, for instance, paint the invade-Iraq-decision scene as representational but also show Clinton in the room, or the elder Bush. Even though both men were very much present in the sense of having complicity in the event / in the sense of having contributed to it.

Maybe one reason mainstream art abandoned representation is that photography cost artists their courage to imagine scenes in mythological terms. Much easier to just blop a little paint on the canvas and call it a day. Faster, too.

Or maybe it’s because we’re wrestling with myth today in more overt or direct terms than we were once. Nobody’s willing to concede to the authority of a shared myth, so our art is naturally fractured and timid.

Jah, who knows.

Anyway. From the V&A we ended up at Hyde Park. Passed a couple of pensioners feeding the birds and squirrels. I tried to get a picture of an English robin — they were flitting out from the bushes onto the pensioners’ hands to snatch whatever they were offering, crumbs or seeds — but I wasn’t quick enough. I did get a fairly decent shot of another bird I’d never seen before: a wood pigeon. They resemble the familiar rock pigeons you see all over in U.S. cities but are quite a bit larger.

At one end of Hyde Park we paused to look at Kensington Palace, where Princess Di lived.

Lovely, but a bear to keep dusted, I understand.

We didn’t go in.

We did go in St. James’s Church in Piccadilly, where William Blake was baptized in this font in 1757.

I think it was that same day that we went to Sir John Soane’s Museum (spelt right this post). No photography allowed inside, so I don’t have pics, but take my word for it, it’s worth a visit if you get a chance. Amazing collection of art and antiquities. Epitomizes the notion of a wealthy 19th century English Collector.

I forget where we ate that evening. Probably a pub. It was about that time, if I recall correctly, that my Gracious Host began exulting about my being such a cheap date, the way I kept volunteering for Guinnesses and pub grub :-D

But I know where we went afterward, because it was Valentine’s Day, and we went to see Madame Butterfly, which I mentioned a couple of posts ago.

Extraordinary climax to an extraordinary day . . . and after that, Paris.

I’m home!

I took over 400 photos!

This is the beauty of digital photography. Out of that many, I’m bound to have a handful that are at least in focus :-)

The photo fun didn’t start until Tuesday however. That’s because before leaving for the trip, I carefully charged both of my two camera batteries — but failed to execute the next step, which is to put at least one of the charged batteries back into the camera. So although we did some sightseeing Monday the 12th, walking from our hotel (the Radisson Edwardian in Grafton) to Trafalgar Square , then wandering for an hour or so through the National Portrait Gallery, I got no photos. Ahem.

Starting making up for it the next day however.

We began with the British Museum, repository of art and cultural artifacts collected by the Brits, including, of course, the Elgin marbles.

I also took a couple pics of the museum’s famous library and reading room.

Spent the rest of that day walking around. One of the things that struck me was the way so many streets are curved, and faced by buildings contoured to match.

My Gracious Host made sure to steer me past this.

And we ended up by another landmark.

By then I was suffering from my only major planning error — much worse than the camera battery snag — I didn’t choose the right shoes. Actually, the right shoes don’t exist, but that’s a rant and this isn’t a rant post. In any case, by the end of the week I’d given up, bought a pair of sneakers, boxed up my oh-so-stylish boots and loafers and had sent them home by post. In the meantime, my Gracious Host was kind enough to give me lots of pub breaks, and that night found us a Greek restaurant not far from the hotel for our dinner. Thanks, Gracious Host!

Back with more soon :-)

Hi, all — I’m having a fantastic time :-)

Yesterday was Paris — the Louvre and Eiffel Tower — the only downside to the ET was that the lines were so long, it ate up several hours so we ended up having to catch the last train back to London instead of the 7:19 Eurostar like we’d planned. But the view was fantastic — sunset from the top of the ET!

In London — where to start? Victoria and Albert Museum, National Portrait Gallery, John Soame Museum, the Thames, Big Ben, House of Parliarment, British Museum, Hyde Park, Albert Memorial, Albert Hall, Covent Garden. Wednesday night we saw Madame Butterly at the Royal Opera House, which was fantastic, possibly one of the single most beautiful things I’ve ever experienced.

There’s still lots on the list to go — we’re going to do the British National and the Tate sometime in the next couple of days. And today my host has promised me we’ll take one of the tour buses — drive by photo ops, hooray!

Back soon!

That’s my destination, with a one-day side trip to France, during which time my English friend has admonished me: I’m to let him do all the talking, and forget wearing my cowboy boots or my I heart W tee shirt. Joke, joke, my feet are too wide for pointy-toed boots and my tee shirts are all from Gap.

I leave in two weeks. I’m not taking my laptop; I’ll try to update my blog once or twice while I’m there, and will bring back lots of pics for blogging when I get home :-)

I’m practically beside myself with excitement, so much so that even the threatened series of strikes by British Airways cabin crews has done nothing to dampen my spirits. And n0w I see today there’s been a breakthrough, the first planned strike has been averted. Hooray!