opera, rodin, bastille, louvre, spectacle...not in that order!

These past few days, I have taken a TON of photos. Thus, there are going to be a lot of photos on this post, and I don't really care if there are too many because I'm so incredibly excited to put them up.

First, I want to include a picture of the Bastille concert I went to before heading off to chill on the Seine (this was the night of the 13th, as I mentioned.)

Skip to Friday--field trip with my class. We started at the Opera Garnier, and then walked along some of Haussman's boulevards and visited some of the awesome covered "passages", little shopping pathways covered with glass where "les flaneurs" used to hang out. 

Me and Gus in the Garnier theater beneath Marc Chagall's painted ceiling.

View from one of the rooms of the Opera Garnier, looking out onto the Place de l'Opera.

After the field trip, my friends and I ate lunch at a cafe, and then a couple of us went to the Louvre for a little under an hour. I also bought my ticket for a contemporary dance show that was that night.

An ancient Greek sculpture in the Louvre.

The performance was AMAZING! It was very postmodern--the choreographer (Dominique Bagouet) was obviously heavily influenced by many of the choreographers I've been studying: Merce Cunningham, Yvonne Rainer, Trisha Brown. It was more humorous, though, and combined very technically difficult choreography (weight changes, tempo shifts) with crazy, child-like humor (the dancers talked onstage, got annoyed with eachother. There was even one section where they "silent-talked" to each other from across the stage). I LOVED IT. The venue was a stage built outside in the middle of the Palais Royal. One cool moment was when a man stepped out on to his twenty-million dollar balcony and saw the modern dance performance going on just beneath him. What a lucky guy, huh? My thought was, "Only in Paris!"

The entrance to the performance was in the middle of the Palais Royal, where there is an installation-sculpture by modernist sculptor Pol Bury.

The stage set up for the performance. The balcony (sort of obscured by the lights) is where the man wandered out to find the show going on.

That night I met up with friends afterwards and spent the night at my friend Anna's house, since her host family is out of town. Then yesterday (Saturday) she and I met back up and went to the Musee Rodin together, which was absolutely beautiful. We both did some drawings (hers were amazing, as she is an artist. Very linear but loose, free lines). After that, we walked to this adorable market street, Rue Cler, where we bought cheese and bread for dinner. We then went back to Anna's and made an amazing meal of fresh salad, grilled zucchini and peppers, eggs with camambert, and bread and cheese. We had peaches with creme fraiche for dessert. It was quite wonderful after such a relaxing day. We then stayed in and watched Pulp Fiction, which neither of us had ever seen. It blew my mind, to say the least.

Part of a sculpture (not by Rodin, by some contemporary guy) at the Musee Rodin.

Rodin's The Thinker.                                

The artist's signature.                                 

A sketch I did of one of Rodin's sculptures, Torse de jeune femme cambrée (Torso of Young Woman with Arched Back).

I am now up on a lazy Sunday and am going to shower and head off to the Marais, where I plan to grab some falafel and go to the Pompidou Center. I also am going to see some people from Yaledancers for dinner tonight. It's been a great weekend, and I'm looking forward to the week!