Scroll down for the photos if my ramblings are of no interest to you.
The way things are built projects an aesthetic and the engineering. The engineering loses me, frankly, except insofar as something stands up or falls down. But the aesthetics, yes, a troupe of trapeze artists in the fetid mind.
I was unprepared for the staggering accomplishment that is the Eiffel Tower, arguably the most influential piece of 19th-century art .
.. if art makes us look at things differently, then the mere quantity of its impact places it in the forefront of artistic imagining.
I am sorry they tore down Les Halles, but the remaining structures give one a taste. I did not, following Rick Steeves’ advice, bother to enter the suburban shopping mall they tastefully hid beneath the remaining steel.
The architecture of the Musée d’Orsay came close to making me forget the art. There are more photos of it on the page devoted to it, but I include a few here because of the architect’s felicitous combination of the 19th and 20th centuries in its preservation.
One photo only of the Pompidou, which is a monstrosity. Its square repels, its entrance refuses, garbage blows around like inanimate pigeons. What were they thinking.
Click on any photo to to start the slide show.
© 2008, Stephen Arod Shirreffs. Take any photos you like. If you want to use them for fun, give me credit (Stephen Arod Shirreffs). Permission is pointedly not granted for any religious, commercial, or political purpose. If you want to use any photos for commercial or political purposes, send me email to foto at gunung dot com.
