Saturday, October 21, 2017

200 Reviews of Paris: The Louvre








Let's get the star thing right out of the way:


🌟🌟🌟✫✫


Three out of five stars.



Oh yes, I knew that one would rock you back on your heels. A mere three out of five stars from a passionate aesthete for one of the most acclaimed museums in the world.

Impossible! You say.

Well, I'll admit the second removed star is a bit of pique. But the first removed star is wholly deserved.

What a crappy sort of museum. Oh sure, the collection is arguably better than any other museum's on the face of the earth. The pyramid entrance is a stroke of near genius. The history is rich. A dog could run this museum and it would pull down four stars. 

Someone should go out and get a dog.

"Boy, he really hated the Louvre." You must be thinking.

Au contraire mes amis. Oh lord those Rembrandts. The Mona Lisa. The Caravaggio, Death of a Virgin, poorly presented away from its natural home (fuck the 17th Century Carmelites!), but still such a wonder. I had to duck out before we even saw a tenth of what I wanted to see. What miracles!

But alas, poor maps, unexplained sub entrances, broken, inaccurate detours around areas under repair, hideous and questionable security lines, mediocre gift shop, an unpleasant crowd vibe, and, oh boy, this is the painful part, no, I can't say it. It's too horrible. It's beyond human comprehension, fine, I'll say it:

Poor museum cafes!!!!

In Paris! In the Louvre!

I should remove another star.















4 comments:

  1. Didn't you see "The Raft of the Medusa"? Why do i recall you loving that painting?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Ouch. It was not a super happy trip to the Louvre and we'd had enough before we even saw the French painting. I don't think I could have seen it happily, but I do feel sad that I didn't see it. I think we even first thing headed towards the French Painting and ended up in the Dutch painting instead! While it was a shame, my goodness, those Rembrandts are really good.

      Delete
  2. Truely, the Dutch rooms are like jewelry boxes. <3

    ReplyDelete

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