L'après-midi d'un Petit Palais

I always have a lovely time when I go to this museum. It's near me, free, and usually not full of people pushing one aside to take a million photos of a cliché painting or sculpture. There is one Monet in the PP, that's it. No ubiquitous works of art, so I like it because it makes me think and open my eyes and mind to things I haven't been told I must find spectacular.

The place itself alone is worth a visit. There are gorgeous mosaics on the ground level entrance and magnificent, subtle and charming ceilings. It's a place that allows one to roam at one's own pace, it isn't stuffy. It's got an art nouveau feel to it... freeing and delightful.

I was disappointed because they moved the one Delacroix painting they have (had?) and this was the main reason I went there yday. But I enjoyed it.

I love this floor (and this sculpture):

Reflets dans l'eau

There is a professional photo of the Palais reflected in the wee artificial pond in the courtyard garden. I saw it yday and it made me want to take a couple and see how they'd turn out. Not brilliant. I couldn't get enough of the borders of the pond to appear in the photo, which is a pity because it's a most tasteful combination of blues and yellow/orange mosaic. Still, it isn't too bad.

Snail pace

Walking in a museum slowly allows one to see in a different way. Yes, my back starts to hurt if I walk slowly, but I think it would have been a shame to miss this:

How long do you think it'll take this tiny escargot to see everything in the Petit Palais? Good thing it didn't choose the Louvre...

Beleza pura

Tom, Oscar, make me fly!

Ah... tanta saudade!

Original version

Kaleidoscopic Kisses

Which is the odd one out?

and

Which is your favourite?

and

Why?

Brancusi

Hayez

Picasso

Rodin

Klimt

Angela, Couples, Updike, Women, Humanity

I've observed something curious recently and, after I started reading Updike, I managed to recognize it in one of his characters in Couples, Angela.

Updike describes her v well. She's gorgeous and unhappy because she denies her humanity. She's no longer a body, no longer an animal, only ether. She feels closer to the stars in the sky than to any physical reality which surrounds her. She's polite to a fault in order to avoid real emotion. Her husband, Piet, is cheating on her with at least two women, one of whom was 5 months into her pregnancy when the affair started. Angela knows he cheats but pretends she doesn't. (I have not finished the book yet, but it seems she's about to undergo a bit of a transformation...)

There are women who have distanced themselves from their human reality. They've somehow decided that to be detached is better. They're often v good-looking women who dress well and have good taste in all things, are refined and sophisticated, but have somehow stopped living. Angela is like this.

I saw a woman at the café yesterday while sipping a cappuccino. She was sitting at the table to my left, drinking a herbal infusion of some kind. The busy and necessarily pretty waitress came to collect the money; the woman in question fiddled with an impressive number of coins inside a tiny little purple leather pouch which she took out of her soft-leather handbag, almost like a magician pulls a rabbit out of a hat, only more slowly and far more gracefully. A purple leather rabbit.

The waitress didn't want to wait for her to sort out the change, turned on her heel in a bit of a huff and went to another table ... I thought she'd get annoyed. She didn't. She didn't really seem to be there physically, it was v curious. Her female friend had gone to buy cigarettes at a Tabac two blocks down. I glanced at her discreetly ... she smiled politely but absent-mindedly and I wondered when was the last time she'd had an orgasm. A real one, the kind that makes ppl forget themselves and just ... attempt a shot on goal from the midfield at the 89th minute of the 2nd half. Just go for it.

I thought about Angela.

Then I wondered if there are any men like that. I've never met a man who was this removed from his humanity and body.

I wonder what causes this. Excess cosmetics? Excess preening? Do we women run the risk of beginning to think we're made of porcelain and might break or melt if we come into contact with sweat? Forty-two years after women burnt their bras in the public squares throughout the West and we're back in a corset, albeit invisible (thus sadly unsexy)? Why do our societies dislike the human body so much? We're encouraged to make an effort to look our best all the time, but doesn't this lead, paradoxically, to a state of mind conducive to worrying about how we look at a time -- even if one looks good! -- when it is preferable to pay attention to how we feel, our sensations?

This probably is nothing new and I'm the one who's behind, only noticing it now, with Updike's help.

Maybe it's Paris, full of very good-looking women with a lot of money and haute couture; appear to be, look the part, wear the luxury velvet and silken armor. Makes them feel stronger? No idea. Of course it's pleasant to feel good about how we look. It does make a difference, it is far better than feeling bad about it, but when does it become an obsession?

Or does it even have anything to do with appearances?

T. Sturge Moore. 1870–

Silence Sings

SO faint, no ear is sure it hears,
So faint and far;
So vast that very near appears
My voice, both here and in each star
Unmeasured leagues do bridge between;
Like that which on a face is seen
Where secrets are;
Sweeping, like veils of lofty balm,
Tresses unbound
O'er desert sand, o'er ocean calm,
I am wherever is not sound;
And, goddess of the truthful face,
My beauty doth instil its grace
That joy abound.

Language & Music

They’re sisters, aren’t they? They’re really close sisters who have a strong, intimate, bond. And yet.

And yet they’ve also got two distinct, mutually exclusive, essences. Radical? Yes, but true. Or at least that’s my theory!

The rules & regulations which structure language can be bent, modified, and/or eliminated; those which frame music are not subject to endless tinkering & prodding, they’re firm and fixed. Grammar, syntax, prosody… they’re susceptible to the changes which occur in society and in a given culture over a period of time; but music’s rules are perennial. Though they may vary from one civilization to another, the internal rules of a musical tradition remain the same over time.

Feel free to disagree, but consider this for a second first:

Language is a slave, Music is a slavemaster.

Language is flexible -- too flexible. It is both her charm and her deepest flaw. She bends according to who is using her at any given time and can be made to say anything. She can be beautiful or she can be beaten to a bruised and bloody pulp, be badly hurt and scarred, tortured, brutalized. She has no life of her own, but rather depends on the qualities of her “handler”.

Though remarkably faithful when understood well, treated with tenderness & loved fully, she will not hesitate to give herself entirely to another, more powerful or richer owner if he summons her, and allow him to take from her whatever he wants. She doesn’t know the concepts of eternity or free will, and can also succumb to the promises of false prophets and usurpers if they offer temporary and superficial pleasure. She can also give much pleasure, and not only the shallow kind, but long-lasting and genuine, though probably not infinite.

Language is bound to whoever owns her at the time; she’s gagged unless allowed to fully blossom. Her fate is sad; she will never stay with anyone forever… she’s unable to belong fully to any one person. Her nature doesn’t allow it, it would violate what makes her attractive to begin with, her charm; the intuitive knowledge one has that she’s hiding something all the time - she has many secrets. If she were able to belong to only one owner, she would fade and finally disappear in the air… like rainbows. Like rainbows she is intangible, and her temporary owner, if he is wise, knows he will not have her forever, knows he can manipulate and abuse her but that eventually she will flee, though he never knows when or for how long. This is why all potential and current owners want her, because even though she is a submissive and loving slave, they must contrive to give her some pleasure and show her some admiration and respect, make an effort, however hesitant, or else she gives only the bare minimum and does not hide her cold side.

Often, Language asks her older, wiser sister, Music, for advice. Sometimes her sister takes pity on her and helps her. She shines under the bright light which emanates from her sister, but nothing Music does can help Language for good because her nature is to obey and serve.

Music can’t grasp these precepts by which her sister lives. Music rules, never obeys. Many think they have an ascendancy over her, but they’re wrong. In these instances, they were simply fooled by the sweet prelude which may accompany Music’s full ecstasy, but it is in reality merely a collection of mermaids singing: for a moment, the sailor thinks he will be able to have a mermaid because she sings for him - such sublime, delicate notes! So full of promise! So dizzying! - and then he falls into the water and drowns. Disgracefully. Duped & humiliated. The mermaid is not real, but a mirage announcing the grotesque demise of fools with delusions of grandeur. This prelude Music allows some to see is not her actual climax.

Music, like Language, is not married to only one person, cannot be; but her nature allows her to be fully faithful to several of her slaves at the same time. She gives herself entirely to each of them in an egalitarian manner, provided her slaves do the same. This is not an ordinary exchange in which the slave is not needed: he is, because it is the only way in which Music can express herself and show her beauty, in a symbiotic way. But she’s demanding and doesn’t show her full beauty easily! One must work hard to please her sensibility.

She keeps few slaves, all things considered, the better to control their lives with her impossible charms and ability to satiate even the most gluttonous appetites. Nevertheless, no slave who seriously dedicates his life to Music can have the guarantee of eternal happiness, only of satisfaction - of the most significant order; curiously, though, the ones who do choose this path do so because they simply can do no other. Music then decides who among them is worthy of possessing a fraction of her attention. There is a fine-tuned balance in this exchange. Those whom she does not pick are given the mermaid (Music is generous!) as a proxy, and may even live long enough to realize this is an illusion…

Viva España!!!

So this is it. The World Cup is over.

I was very happy to see Spain win. Justice in football!

Holland played reasonably well, but if they had won I would have been sad. At one point I said to the bookgit, who was rooting for Holland, that if they won I'd stop watching football for good. They were violent, did not concentrate on playing the game, but on finding subtle and not-so-subtle ways of hurting the Spanish players. The latter, on the other hand, managed to stay calm even in the face of some of the most egregious ruling and absence of ruling by the English referee, Mr. Web. They were completely focused.

It is a shame the Spanish coach didn't put Fabregas in earlier in the match. Maybe if he had, the Spanish team would have won by a 2 or 3 goal difference. But he was hurt, apparently, so only came in 5 minutes before the end of regular time, injecting the team with new energy.

I can't remember another match in which Brasil wasn't playing that made me cheer so much.

In terms of the actual playing, there was nothing outstanding, except for a few plays toward the end of regular time. The Spanish master short and rehearsed passes.

Robben, the Dutch centre-forward, did everything he could to score, it must be said. He is an invaluable player and I felt a little sorry for him - despite his violent approach - in the end, given this was his second failed World Cup final. And quite likely his last.

In short, I was happy to see the better, more deserving team win. It's something we get to see so seldom in other areas of life... Easy to understand why sports events are so popular, in this context. We can see cheaters losing and hard work, skill, and passionate commitment prevail.

Brasil: See you in 2014!

Don't cry for me Argentiiiinaaaaa

Germany 4 ... Argies? NIL

Ahhhh, bliss. I just saw a Brazilian journalist on television being interviewed by a French sports journo. Asked who he was going to root for now that Brasil is out, he said: "Brasilians have a simple approach to this: once we're out, we support whoever's playing Argentina." This is v true! ABA Anyone But Argentina.

Maradona FDPVTCSVCTM! <---abbreviated cursing in Portuñol

Holland 2 Brasil 1