I Vant to See the Etchings

Thursday I invited myself over to look at some guy’s etchings. Well, guys’: Albrecht Dürer and Lucas Cranach, elder and younger. Quite the group, though they didn’t even know I was there.

It was the first rainy day—the weather had been getting cooler for a couple of days, but this morning I woke to find it had rained a little already. The sun was implying it might soon break through the clouds, though, as I walked to the Hôtel de Ville Métro stop. As the escalator reached the open air coming out of the Champs-Élysées-Clemenceau station, however, a few drops of rain were spattering down—which within seconds turned to a downpour. I managed to whip out my umbrella and get it open, but the rain and wind were so hard my jeans were wet to the knee by the time I walked (quickly) the short distance to the portico of the Grand Palais. It was the Petit Palais I wanted, but any port in a storm, and quite a few other people had had the same impulse.

Not more than ten minutes later we were back to only a sprinkle, and I crossed the street to my intended. Destination. What can I say? That, in my humble opinion, Dürer “wins,” if only because his etchings seem—warmer, more expressive? I found the small etchings exhibit only after walking through the beautiful glassware exhibit (as in René Lalique and Émile Galle, etc., swooningly beautiful Art Nouveau pieces, or surviving ancient ones), the pretty garden while it wasn’t raining, the (how is it Russia follows me?) gallery of Russian (and Greek, for the record) icons—not the treasures of the Tretyakov, but interesting, and most stunning of all, somehow, a Jan de Beers that took up a wall (I wasn’t familiar with him, but after reading up a little, know he was a Belgian realist painter of the late 19^th century, whose paintings were so photograph-like they became the cause of a huge controversy when he was accused of merely painting over photos—leading in turn to much discussion of the acceptance of photographs themselves as art. Etc. That, in fact, being what is so arresting about this painting, “The Funeral of Charles the Good,” in the 12^th century: how disconcertingly photographic it is, the kneeling monks, the expressions on the knights’ faces—some pious (or pretending to be), some bored, some glancing directly at the viewer, and so on. There’s something mesmerizing about it, as if a photograph had in fact been possible that day.

Exiting into the not-rainy-but-still-overcast-and-windy day, I decided to walk on to the Eiffel Tower. It wasn’t that far (as a crow flies. Relatively speaking. For someone who hadn’t gotten up that morning feeling unaccountably weak); I’d looked on a map before coming; I could see it “right there,” in the not-too-far distance.

Once past the exuberant gilt of the Pont Alexandre III (Russia, again! and coziness between monarchs: visible in various films (A Very Long Engagement, though I’d never realized that—underneath—is where that shooting takes place; Midnight in Paris . . . ), the series of little parks all along the Seine walkway contain various monuments—to Lafayette, to Russian (!) troops who fought with the French in World War I, to the victims of the Armenian genocide.

Cross Pont de l’Alma, and before long you stumble (maybe literally) across the outdoor exhibit of the “Photoquai” biennale exhibit by the Musée de Quai Branly, breathtaking, amazing photos by photographers from around the world. Which, because you are (I am) now twice as tired and the Tower is still teasing, there, between the trees and buildings, only extremely slowly drawing any nearer, you quickly view only two or three of these artists’ (yes) work. One of them, of course, Irina Popova, from somewhere between Europe and China that needs no introduction. Whose series “Anfisa’s family” caused an uproar in St. Petersburg when it was published.

But moving on . . . finally, finally, there it is, tourism central (along with my own neighborhood, admittedly), and the parked buses, and the amateur paparazzi. Though on this damp, almost chilly day, and approaching from the river side, through the trees and shrubbery, this is as minimized as it’s ever going to be. I’d ignored it completely last year (the tower); had only been here once before, my very first time in Paris, and that at night. It’s really, really big. Massive. And beautifully detailed for all its immensity, in a way more modern, brutalist architecture has no patience with. And there, indeed, was the huge inky-black crow, there long before me, strutting and eying me smugly.

The Monument to Peace at the opposite end of the Champ de Mars is very minimalist and serene, unfortunately reachable these days only by running a gantlet of the young gypsy “deaf-mute” scammers who are everywhere. No exaggeration: I’m sure I was approached by at least ten of them. I fell for one last year at the Centre Pompidou, before I learned what they were about. Now, though I feel a bit sorry for their being exploited, I just wish they’d leave me alone.