Day 28: Theory on Hands & Said "Hi" to Napoleon

Judy, Grace and I started off after class time by going to see the Grand et Petit Palais. As we crossed over the Pont Alexadre III bridge, we noticed an uncanny resemblance of one of the lion statues to Simba...unfortunately I did not get a picture of this resemblance; Judy as that picture, though she claims that he looks more like Aslan.

(View of Pont Alexandre III & Invalides in the distance)

We walked by the front of Invalides and made our way to the Hotel Biron which is where the Musee Rodin is located. Hotel Biron was built in the 1720s and is where Rodin lived in the early twentieth century. The gardens were beautiful!

(Garden outside Musee Rodin)

Even though daisies are (and will remain) my favorite flowers (with lilacs being a close second), I love roses because of Beauty and the Beast--especially the renditions written by Robin McKinley (Rose Daughter and Beauty). So I took some pictures of the roses and of some pretty blue flowers that I really liked. It's not often that you find truly blue things in nature--besides the sky of course. And since blue is my favorite color, I thought I would get a picture of them.

(Pretty blue flower in the garden at Musee Rodin)

(Yellow rose outside Musee Rodin)

(Red rose outside Musee Rodin)

We saw some of the famous Rodin bronze sculptures outside--Penseur, Gates of Hell, etc. But I think some of my favorite were inside--The Kiss (of course...this is because of Amelia's love for this piece when she took Humanities in high school), Cathedral, Secret, Main d'Amants--all by Rodin...and all of which are hands but I have a thing for hands. But I also really liked two of Camille Claudel's pieces: Clotho and La Petit Chatelaine.

I think that hands are so beautiful. They can express so much feeling and can tell a lot about a person. I tried to explain my "Theory on Hands" to Brian and Philip (at different times) and I think I did a rather horrible job of explaining because, as I remember, it sounded terribly cliche. However, I am going to try again to explain why I love hands so much and why these pieces by Rodin really caught my attention.

One: Have you ever tried to draw or depict a hand that is proportionally and realistically accurate? It's incredibly hard and painstaking work. I've tried it once and I haven't ever seriously attempted again. There are so many lines in a hand from all the movement of the knuckles and the veins and the nails. If someone can ever depict hands in an artistic way, I give them props and my admiration because hands are hard.

Two: Hands are one of the ways that we connect with someone else. We don't put our heads together and walk down the street--that would be weird, though hilarious. At the museum today I saw two different pairs of kids holding hands so that they would stay together and not get lost. That was so cute! I remember when I've held hands with my parents and my little brothers and the security that I felt holding my parents hands and the feeling of wanting to protect my little brothers from everything when I held their hands. And of course, as I've gotten older and have held non-familial hands to show affection, that is another kind of connection that I just love about hands. They seek each other if they know the other person will hold it.

Three: Scars. I love scars on hands because there is always a story (well, there is usually a story with all scars and I do like scars in general), but hands are highly visible and you don't have to roll sleeves up or take off your sock to show scars on your hands. Callouses are also pretty cool on hands and develop pretty easily from playing an instrument, mowing the lawn, etc.

So I don't know if that explained really at all my "Theory on Hands" and why I think they're fascinating, but it was an attempt to explain why I liked especially those three pieces by Rodin.

(Cathedral by Rodin)

(Secret by Rodin)

(Main d'Amants by Rodin)

(Main d'Amants by Rodin)

(Main d'Amants by Rodin)

(La Petite Chatelaine by Claudel)

(Clotho by Claudel)

After spending a good amount of time in the museum, we left and went to Invalides. We were super hot and the cool marble building felt so very nice. I took two pictures of Napoleon's tomb and told Napoleon that Sam Bateman said hi (yes, I remembered).

(Napoleon's tomb; it is huge)

(Outside of Invalides)

After we were sufficiently cooled-down, we bought some food at a Carrefour, then went and ate it in front of the Eiffel Tower. Overall, a very nice afternoon.