Love to Louvre

The days are flying by now as my time in Paris comes to an end. There’s been little time to blog in between finishing off pieces of work in the studio, catching those last few museums I haven’t managed to visit or seeing some of the exhibitions which are coming around now as the year gets properly into gear, shopping for souvenirs, making sure I visit all my favourite restaurants, cafés patisseries one last time – and I haven’t even begun to think about packing!

Visited the Louvre today for the last time this visit to spend some more time in my favourite gallery The Gallerie Sept Metres, where some of the Louvre’s impressive collection of the 13th – 15th century Italian painters are displayed and where I have promised myself I would come back and do some more research, after my last visit.

Just love the stampede for La Jaconde the minute the museums doors are open – it amuses me every time. Looks like there are some impressive renovations for the Islamic Art collections in train - will look forward to seeing them on another visit.

At the end of last week, I finally succeeded in getting to see the Basquiat retrospective at the Musee d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, which was definitely worth getting up early to avoid the queues for. It was a busy show - with crowds and with the amount of work on view.

I like Basquiat’s work – hype notwithstanding - particularly some of the earlier paintings. He had a great instinct for colour and a knack for a catchy motif, probably honed during his street/ subway art days. Predictably, I liked the works on paper best, as I thought they somehow felt the least self-conscious and that they had the least to prove.