The only things that are not expensive in Paris, indeed cheap, are wine and access to art. There were many museums and galleries I wanted to take in and even eliminating places I'd visited on a previous trip (the Louvre, Picasso Museum) it was still an overwhelming undertaking. Once I got to Paris an additional set of institutions presented themselves. There is so much art in Paris it seems there are more museums than cars. This is what I saw:
At the Pompidou I went through the permanent collection, unenthused in that these collections are often eventually boring. I did encounter the work of many French and obscure (to me) European artists whose work I had not known. What I'd really gone to "Bobo" for was the Cy Twombly drawings retrospective, which was good, and then the Sophie Calle show which was very good though weird to experience in French with "truncated" English translation cards. I had to go back through the beginning sections a second time to really take them in.
The Palais de Tokyo is something of a cross between P.S.1 and Dia: Beacon-a wonderful, raw gallery/museum space with a focus purely on forward thinking contemporary art. A lot of Parisians, while reverential of the space itself, were dismissive of much of the work shown to this point. The big group show I witnessed, "Playlist", was sort of hit or miss with some conceptual highs and then real clunkers. I love what they're trying to do at Palais de Tokyo though. An artist from Berlin named Daniel Pflumm had an awesome video installation on display of flashing, morphing corporate logo images to techno music that kept my attention and seemed a hit with young visitors. It was the kind of piece Jerry Saltz would hate but might show up in a place like Maccarone in Chinatown or one of the Whitney Biennials.
Although it isn't technically an "art space" I traversed through the Cimetiere de Montparnasse and was taken aback by the sheer number of artistic giants buried there-Baudelaire, Beckett, Man Ray, Satre & Beauvoir (next to one another), Marguerite Duras, Ionesco, Tristan Tzara, Guy de Maupassant, Jean Seberg, Brancusi, Serge Gainsbourg(!). It was definitely a weird experience though. What do the dead care of where they're buried? I turned off my iPod while strolling through, to show respect, but it was such a weird experience. It's like the most extreme velvet-roped club mixed with the Oscars (for the dead) you've ever been to. The living may be touched and in awe of such spectacle but what do the dead care of such vulgarity? As much as one would like to be part of a "club of giants" I'd really rather just be buried near my family, my grandparents, where I was born and grew up. It was too much being inside that place, I got the hell out of there.
Everything shuts down on Monday and so I was unable to visit and then never made it back to the Catacombs, tunnels and caves below Paris, nor the Foundation Cartier-a gallery or rather small museum with an exhibit by African artist J'aime Cheri Samba that I was told was very, very good. Instead I wound up at the only institution that seemed open-Paris' Erotic Museum situated in Pigalle right amidst all the sex shops. Here I saw lots of old erotic films (ooh la la) and much tantalizing photography and art, from ancient times right up to the present. It certainly got the blood pumping. Down in the basement they have a collection of old "sex machines" created for the sole purpose of pleasuring women. You should see some of the appendages these had attached.
I caught a screening of the unreleased-in-the-U.S. "Ken Park" by photographer/filmmaker Larry Clark and understand why it has yet to find distribution here-it's often silly, pretty minor, and without a doubt gratuitous. One scene has a kid chocking himself with a tie attached to a doorknob while he masturbates to women playing tennis on TV. In real time he jerks himself to orgasm, on camera, an impressive cinematic feat no doubt, but pointless and silly. Apparently the French have been eating it up.
That night I sat in on one of Nadege's acting classes (in French). This particular session was at her acting coach's apartment and was a wonder to behold in that I obviously had to be hyper aware of the physicality of the acting, the pantomime. Although I got a bit of the French, paying attention to the tone of the actor's voices, facial expressions and physical being was tantamount. In that a lot of what I'm writing now involves the physicality of actors' movement having to decipher performance without the use of language was especially instructive.
Nadege finally allowed me to view video footage of a dance and movement piece she has been crafting and filming over the last year and it was an intense, fascinating piece of movement theater that she simply must do something with-raw, personal, a heartfelt physical language cutting through space. A woman, a camera, and an attack on physical space, all done in a homemade studio cleared out of her apartment space. At least three of her colleagues (I included) are clamoring to edit the collected segments into some kind of whole work. While in Normandy I also got to view video of Sarah and Etienne's troupe "La Bazooka." They'd put on a mesmerizing dance and performance piece in a "structural" environment built for an audience to stroll through and to an extent become part of the extravaganza. Multiple, simultaneous dance pieces, wheelchairs, labyrinths of tunnels and stage areas-the performance and its subsequent film by a video artist are astounding works. Etienne crafted a cut and paste soundtrack out of found music and recycled film and television clips. It was a little disconcerting sitting on a couch next to Sarah while she tended to her baby while watching her on the TV screen as this incredible half-dressed sexual S/M goddess dancing some art garage post-modern lap dance. Really crazy, groovy, new after-modern shit.
We trekked out to the Les-Frigos performance space in the 13ème arrondissement (not too far from that club on a barge Batofar) but it was closed that day and so I just circled the grounds, in the rain, and checked out the mad cool graffiti bombed all over the building. Cool place. I'd love to check out the musical and performance pieces that go on there.
The Intitut du Monde Arab was a treat as promised by artist John Griefen, who hangs at Moto and simply loves the place. It is indeed filled with rich and buoyant color everywhere (one of Griefen's obsessions) and intricate Arabian ceramics, rugs, textiles, scientific instruments and clocks. The space is smaller than I'd imagined it to be really and made me pine for the Met's Islamic Art wing, which I'm yet to explore properly.
The Musée Rodin moved me beyond emotion. I have been so spiritually obsessed with the sculpture of Rodin over the years that I find myself seeking out casts wherever they are found. (They have a wonderful collection on the top floor of the Brooklyn Museum that looks just grand in the new space.) To finally make it to the man's house and studio holding all of his works was spiritually overwhelming. In the courtyard is the monumental bronze of Balzac, fused to a mysterious shroud, reeking of intense, dark, elegant artistic integrity. The Monument to the Burghers of Calais with twisted, sobbing, contorting bodies almost brought tears to my eyes. Inside the museum are dozens and dozens of astonishing, moving pieces spanning the man's entire career. There is a hall devoted to the works of Camille Claudel and a piece there has three intertwined, distorted individuals set in a kind of shifting spiritual motion. There is a giant marble piece by Rodin called something like "Artist and Model" (or Muse) that captures the very essence of creation, love, and desire. I view a photo of it whenever I'm in need of inspiration or spiritual faith. I could write a whole piece on the Rodin Museum.
The Orsay is an odd museum in that it houses art from France's national collection over that tiny pocket of time starting in the 1840's, where the Louvre's collection generally ends until the modern art collection of the Pompidou. It encompasses that leading up to Impressionism, Post-Impressionism, and the first hints of modernism. It traverses the work of Ingres, Courbet, Manet, Renoir, Gaugin, and Van Gogh, amongst others. A fine focus on late 19th century architecture, furniture and decorative arts emphasize a world in the midst of the industrial revolution with an altering approach to artistic creation to match. An interesting range of focus that I really loved and eventually made perfect sense. The works of Bonnard, Vuillard, and others of the Nabis group were especially revealing and impressive (Paul Serusier's "The Talisman" indeed a landmark work). The pastels of Degas in temperature controlled glass cases were stunning. The Monet room is filled with splendid, vibrant work, in particular the cathedral paintings. I've always thought the inestimable Cezanne a god but to see his work in this context confirmed him as without a doubt the "bridge" from late nineteenth century post-impressionist thought to that of the moderns-Picasso, Braque, Gris, Matisse. Cezanne was mapping the way. The Orsay's rooms of Art Nouveau furniture and precious objects is not only a wonder to breeze through but so lays the groundwork for our modern perception of design that I felt in church. There was a special exhibit by a sculptor named Charles Cordier who I'd never heard of. Cordier spent most of the later half of the 19th century traveling to far away lands documenting the people he came across by crafting meticulous sculptural busts-Africa, Asia, Scandinavia, the Middle East, wherever his travels took him. It was amazing to be in such an "European-centric" space as the Orsay, filled with floors and floors of Caucasian made and based art, and then come across three wonderful rooms filled with the shapes, colors, clothing, and texture of the entire planet-majestic, dignified. I was beside myself with joy. Corbier would have been at home exhibiting in Queens.
My last night in town (missed flight debacle notwithstanding) we hit an "extravaganza" at Pulp Club (next to Rex) that was just off the fucking hook. Initially I was a little annoyed in that the music went from some awesome dub to gaudy "plur" rock before going "rock block" mode, which I hate. Nevertheless it moved to hype ragga, hip-hop, and then jungle-interspersed with really cheesy "live" performances that were just laughable. There were costumes and lit sparklers and glitter all over the place, everyone having a great time (I think it was someone's birthday). I'd been told Pulp Club was a "lesbian club" and this didn't make sense in that the place was teeming with heterosexuals but then once the place began to clear out in the wee hours it was more readily apparent as girls were making out on the dance floor and huddling in booths. There was a lot of moving in and out of a back room. Before we left the DJ started spinning really good electro merged into smart techno. It was a nice, trippy way to end my trip. We caught a cab outside (the Metro stops running at 12:30) and got back to Montmartre as the sun arose.