There are lots and lots of museums in Paris.
I am not a museum lover. I like to go on about how I got dragged to every museum in the world while growing up, and that is why I am tres yawning and dulled and un petit how you say BORED OUT OF MY MIND by zee museums filled with all the leetle tiny objets de boringness--
Where one is supposed to be tres quiet and whispering and no laughing, please. Absolutely no making fun or laughing.
Going to a museum brings out the worst in me. Like all those times when right in the middle of Mass, for god sake, I'd want, need, could barely control, the need to laugh. Loud. Without control. Once that kind of moment hits in any place that takes itself terribly seriously, well, one is done for, n'est pas?
Museums. Very serious indeed. Related to history, ART, culture, architectural detail non pareil, quiet, whispering, guards at every door, which brings out the paranoia big time, can I use my camera or not, am I being crass by even taking photographs, instead of standing in worshipful silence, staring at whatever priceless item I am staring at--
Thinking, how long do I have to stare? Is one minute long enough for this painting? I can see--it's a painting painted a long time ago of a very serious woman, holding a baby who probably died young, and I hate it when that happens, so, maybe I can just move along to the next one...or even fast forward to the front door and outta here--
"Wait a minute," says my companion. "We've only been in here for five minutes. You said you'd give me twenty."
It's much better if I go to a museum alone...and the only place that happens is here in Paris, where, you guessed it--
I LOVE the musees!
I die for love for zee musees here. I pick carefully. I do not, I repeat, do not bother with the gargantuan odes to boringness supreme, as in the Louvre or the Orsay or the Grand Palais, or that nightmarish, the Pompidou.
I go to the Musee des Poupees. I go to the Galerie-Musee Baccaract, Musee
Marmottan, the Musee Nissim de Camondo, the Musee Carnavalet, Cognacq-Jay, Picasso, le Petit Palais, le Musee Gustave Moreau and the Musee de la Vie Romantique. The Musee Jacquemart-Andre. Also the ones that call themselves Fondations...like Le Corbusier and Dubuffet.
There is a never ending supply of these small museums.
My criteria? That they are small, housed in what were beautiful private mansions..or if not mansions, quirky odd, hidden ( I love the hidden ones...the first year I was here I was afraid of them. But last year I broke the noose and found Le Corbusier. I even rang the buzzer at Dubuffett!).
I like them to have a specific product they're about--like the doll museum. Like the crystal. A single artist, and the museum is in his/her former studio (like Gustave Moreau. His dining table was tiny. Could it really have been his? But upstairs were two studios which were soaring).
I like to have to hunt them down. I get all over Paris finding these places.
And, hopefully, they have a gift store. My favorite fall back position when I am trapped at a museum with a die-hard museum aficionado is "I'll meet you in the gift store."
Currently, my favorite store is at the Petit Palais. Though huge and an actual museum,
the museum is light and airy. The art is basically Art Nouveau, which I love, and right now there is an exhibit of the fashion photographer Patrick Demarchelier. His photoes are up amongst the Fauves and the Impressionists. There was much clucking, but it really works. But the gift store...the gift store is fabulous. They have these black candlesticks and these pop up books--
There is a never ending supply of these musees. Last year I missed out on the fan museum, but that one is in the works for this year. It's one that requires one to ring the buzzer. Last year I chickened out. This year I'm bringing my friend Emily who has no fear.
I won't make the museum farther out that has an exhibit of Les Deux Chevaux...although maybe I will. It comes highly recommended.
I will definitely miss the museum that has old carnival rides and such, housed in a huge art nouveau shed somewhere. This one requires reservations and the parties can't be smaller than fifteen. I do not have fifteen friends in Paris....
And finally, I am a musee madness person here because it is EASY. I don't have to drive to get to them. Oh oops, better stop for gas on the way. I don't have to park. I don't have to sit on the freeway in stop and go--
Paris is a dream that way.
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