The Louvre

Every Friday evening after six the museum is free to patrons under twenty-six. I am determined to conquer the Louvre over the course of several Friday evenings. Last Friday I made my first attempt.

The museum was busy at first, but by around seven people started to clear out, leaving behind them a totally chill atmosphere in which I would observe famous works of art.

My favorite section of the museum is the Greek Antiquities floor. Here you find Classical and Hellenistic sculpture and some of my favorite statues. What I appreciate most about these sculptures (aside from the things that anyone who’s taken basic art history can tell you about the idealization of the human form and depictions of mythological tales, etc.) is a quality of newness I can’t help but feel is being expressed in spite of their ancient origins. My imagination is directed to the time when Aristotle was first defining drama, Plato was creating democracy and Socrates was designing education.

My favorite sculpture of all is the Victory of Samothrace. I think it’s everyone’s favorite statue, but I don’t care. The statue is not with the rest of Greek sculpture; it’s displayed by itself at the top of a long stairway. There is no way to do it justice in words.

The Italian paintings floor inevitably leads you to the Mona Lisa. The problem with the Mona Lisa is not that bit about her mouth; it’s that it’s really hard to have an original thought while looking at the Mona Lisa. I found myself thinking things like, “Wow, that painting is really…famous.” I mean, what are you supposed to think?

I felt a great deal of pressure to have the proper reaction to the famous works of art in the Louvre. The only solution that I could find to this problem was to stand and stare at them until my mind went completely blank. At that point I could begin to see the piece for what it was then and what it was when it was first created. Then I thought about how amazing it was that someone could make a thing so unique and that over hundreds of years that thing can inspire people to make pilgrimages just to stand before it and take it in. Then I thought about how happy I was to be one of those pilgrims.

After the Italian paintings, I explored the French floor. I’m not sure if it’s because I’m in France, but the French paintings were incredibly intriguing. It’s like the guilty pleasure of looking at a map and seeing where you are in relationship to everything else, but with history instead of a map.

Then I went for something completely different, the really old stuff on the bottom floor of the museum.

I’m not going to lie—the Egyptians really freak me out. If I stumbled into ancient Greece, I could see myself hanging out and throwing a Frisbee and drinking some wine. Or if I landed in Mesopotamia I think it’d be chill to garden for a while with those people. But Egyptians are like the hipsters of the ancient world—not even just the fashionable ones, but the hard-core, coke-snorting ones. If an Egyptian came my way, I’d probably stay quiet and look at my feet. When the Egyptian spoke, I’d pretend I knew what the Egyptian was talking about. I’d act like I was so over the Pyramids. Egyptians probably didn’t dance at shows, they just stood they’re really stiff like the statues of the Pharoahs suggest. After standing in awe of the Sphinx and statues of Ramses II, there really wasn’t any where for me to go. Also, the museum was closing.