Un Pichet de Monet (s'il vous plait)

Everyone's heard of the dude. Monsieur "inventor of impressionisme," but I'm telling y'all, this guy was crazy. (good crazy, not... van gogh crazy*).*Note: van gogh crazy is also good crazy...depending on context, give that man paints and easle? good. Give that guy an ear infection and a really sharp knife? bad. (too soon).

So somehow over this past week or so I've developed a bit of a relationship with Monet, nothing "offish" (short for "official." Learn my language), lets just say, before, if I ran into him on the street I'd just say, "DUDE, Claude! DIGGIN what you're doin there, I mean I love your work, amazing use of color....an uh....yeah...laterz!" It was a very "Just Friends" status; Like that movie I can't remember the name of... or that tv show....Seinfeld. But really, I knew, admired, and respected him quite a bit, but NOW? I'm down to sit at a cafe for hours with this man, elbows on the table with my tilted head resting on my folded hands as I gaze into his eyes--and please, you won't be the first to remind me he's old slash dead. I GET IT. YOU'RE INTOLERANT.

But yes, as far as my recent courtship? I'll brevy (breifify?) it up: Je te presente, the places I went, in their order, forgive me for a temporary lapse into I AM AN UTTER SLAVE TO ART, IT MAKES ME GO "GEEE!" phase.

Orangerie - my breath leaves me as I walk into the two rooms of ceiling to floor waterlillies arranged around the walls. Whats that? I get to swim in Monet's lily pond and gaze up at the clouds in the sky, or I mean, in the pond?, uh yes please?

Marmottan- MONET ONLY museum. I'll stand in front of Promenade pres d'Argentuil for a good ten minutes. how did he do it? her dress is white, and yet, there's white, yellow, blue, green, red--all are there....but its WHITE. at least that's what my mind says, Monet knew better.

Musee D'Orsay - I meander through monet's landscapes until the fifth floor, (ah this one floor worth every museum in the united states) where, among other tasty treasures, i find a full wall dedicated to four of Monet's Cathedral paintings. And in my awe I realize I'm not looking at the face of the same cathedral over and over, neither was monet, I'm looking at the light, and how the light plays with a surface (the surface of what? N'importe quoi. (anything)). The light transforms the object....it becomes the "object" seen.

Giverney - my chance to stare at the same lilies the same reflections, the same gardens monet did and to realize everything we see is a combination of colors. everything we see we see through the game it plays with light. NO WONDER HE PAINTED PONDS. Honestly, everything interesting that's in a lily garden is happening just at that water's surface, and the light does magic there.

Rouen - the actual cathedral Monet painted. BUT WAS IT? no. he painted it on some day in the early 20th century. Today, the light isn't the same, it is not the same cathedral. But all of a sudden I saw Monet setting up his thirty easles in his apartment overlooking the cathedral and jumping up and down while clapping his hands and saying "OH BOY OH BOY! THIS is gonna be GOOD!" Monet got to teach the world to see in a new way by taking something most people would just say, "yes. white" and revealing its hidden spectrum.

So yes, Monet was a modern artist, because all of a sudden, he wasn't doing all the work, he wasn't replicating reality but interpreting. He manipulated the ways our minds are used to seeing blots of color so that they say, "Oh yes, apple!" and just doing that with blots of paint--we don't need a delicately fine umbrella perfectly painted for us to know that's the object over the lady's head.. and BOOM. The viewer, NOT PASSIVE, the image, NOT DEAD. Monet made art speak, his art demands its viewer do some of the work.

SO here I am, after two weeks of general museum-ing in Paris, to have accidentally touched on themes of Monet seemingly everywhere I went: dearest Monet, your paint makes the light come alive? Well Paris makes you come alive.

ok rhetorical shpeil over. perhaps i'll begin a more artsy fartsy blog devoted to these "meta" thoughts. so they dont rub shoulders with stories about me being sneezed on or a dog's funny outfit. or not. juxtaposition is a literary device after all. don't worry mystery audience (mom) more stories about dogs' wardrobes yet to come.