rather than do the one day louvre sprint, we decided to jog it over two days.
as we crossed the rue de rivoli in front of the louvre i felt compelled to be a tourist.
i took a panorama shot of the louvre, but it didn't really turn out. here's my favourite shot from the bunch.
we spent a great deal of time in the sculpture areas. it blows you away to see so many famed pieces standing side by side by side.
i've always been taken with pierre ier legros' l'hiver.
and i found a new friend in the roman colonel steve austin (aka inconnu, roman, 10bc).
and then you stumble into spaces like the henry xviii room. yikes.
in our bid to get around the mona lisa we were nearly stomped to death by the battallion of tourists who march through the louvre directly to this sly bit of paint. there's a million photos of the old girl, so here's one of the berserker crowd jostling for position around her. you're technically not supposed to take photos of her, but i turned my flash off to get one of this social phenomenon.
the french museums are more liberal than the british ones and generally allow you to take non-flash photos. while tourists were mostly ok in following this, you watch a flash go off every two and a half seconds around the mona lisa as people hyperventilate in anticipation of getting their shot. pity that da vinci didn't invent a crowd control device for handling his crowds.
there's a million lovely things in the louvre i enjoyed. some of my favoured moments were standing awe struck by the jacques louis david masterworks. these are among my most loved late-18th/early 19th century paintings, and i cherished my time admiring them.
{November 24, 2004 07:59 PM}