PART FOUR - Paris Ultimate Modern Art Tour

Upon exiting the Métro, we will emerge onto a wide plaza.  In the middle of center of the photos below is the fountain La Défense de Paris by Louis-Ernest Barrias, for which the entire project was named.  Look around to see a big really big arch.

Le Grande Arche was designed by Otto von Spreckilsen in time for the bicentennial of the Revolution in 1989. You can see how it lines up with the Arc de Triomphe.

With your back to the Arche, many of the sculptures are right in front of you on the Esplanade. First over to the extreme left is le Pouce by César, and to the right is a piece by Miyawaki. You can take a footbridge over the circular boulevard towards Leonardo de Vinci U for a view of Colosse by Mitoraj.

le Pouce by César

Further down the Esplanade you can see Joan Miró's brightly colored artwork on the right,

The Figures by Joan Miro, 1976

 and to the left is Alexander Calder's Red Spider.

Other examples are at place des Degres, where Kowalski has created a Mineral Landscape. Take the passage de l'Arche to the KPMG building which forms a glass arc around the monumental head Tindajo by Mitoraj. Here is a place you can get maps and lists.

Takis Garden-East by Takis, 1990

There are seemingly countless ways to get to our next destination: Auvers-sur-Oise. I know this isn't exactly in Paris, and we will not exactly be walking, but you will forgive me later. And those choices change with the seasons, so we'll have to determine that when you are ready for your tour. One of the easiest, from the La Défense Metro station we came in on, is to find the Transilion L (purple) to Gare d'Asnières-sur-Seine.

We're not there yet, but since we've stopped in Asnières, I thought I might mention that in the spring of 1887, Vincent used to walk out here to paint and draw. Almost four miles each way. Paul Signac reported:

We painted along the waterfront; we ate in the restaurant and returned to Paris on foot, along the avenues of Saint-Ouen and Clichy. Van Gogh, dressed in a blue smock from a plumber, had painted small paint dots on the sleeves. Close to me, he called and gesticulated, waving his big, still wet cloth (canvas) that he polychromed himself.

Restaurant at Asnières by Vincent Van Gogh, 1887

 And Camille Pissarro recalled running into Vincent on one of his journeys:

...and he absolutely wanted to show his studies to my father - to do that he put them on the street against the wall, much to the surprise of the passersby.

Asnières was popular with other artists as well, such as Seurat, Signac, Renoir and Monet. One of Vincent's best friends, Émile Bernard, lived in the village.

Émile and Vincent at  Asnières

Okay, back at the train station, we transfer to Transilion J (sort of a lime-green) to Ermont Halte Station, where we get the Transilion H (brown), which takes us to Valmondois Train Station, and one more H train for Auvers-sur-Oise. Or, you can wait until summer when there are special trains from the center of Paris. And millions of tourists. I came here in December and it was wonderful.

Our first stop in Auvers-sur-Oise is right inside the train station, the atelier of Monsieur François Laval. François has been painting in the styles of some of the many painters who visited Auvers-sur-Oise: Cezanne, Monet, Vermeer, Van Gogh, and others. He piles the paintings high in his tiny space in the train station. He decorated a few buildings and walls in the vicinity as well.

François

With your back to the station, turn left on rue du Général de Gaulle. After a couple of minutes, on your right, you will reach Vincent van Gogh Park. Here you will find a sculpture of Vincent done by Ossip Zadkine.

Vincent by Ossip, 1956

The people of Auvers-sur-Oise chose him for the honor in 1956. You have now seen some of his work and so you know why. A little farther along on your left, we will see the first of several buildings immortalized by Vincent, La Mairie d'Auvers.

Continue a little farther, then across the street is the Auberge Ravoux, where Vincent stayed the last ninety days of his life. There is nothing to see here, as the owner often says. De Gaulle turns into rue de Zundert right after you pass Auvers de vin (where we had a very lovely meal).

Keep going for eight hundred feet and turn left onto rue de Hugo. After an additional 800 feet the street name changes to rue de Gachet. Go on for seventeen hundred feet to No. 78, Maison de Dr. Paul Gachet. This should be about a 15-minute walk from the last stop. And, honestly, I'm not sure what you will see here.

Dr. Paul

Dr. Gachet, if you know the story of Vincent's demise, was a pivotal player. Vincent painted in his garden as well as doing portraits of Gachet and his family. But I should also mention that Gachet was also friends with Pissaro and Cézanne, whose father was an acquaintance of Gachet.  Cézanne spent a year in Auvers, going to nearby Pointoise everyday to paint alongside Pissaro.  They would also practice etching in Gachet's studio.

Camille and Paul

We will continue for another 9 minutes. Go to the end of Gachet, turn right and then left onto rue de François Coppée. Go about 1400 feet and turn left on rue des Meulières. Take that street for about 600 feet, turn left, walk 50 feet, then right onto rue du Gré.

The name of the painting is Maisons Auvers. Vincent did another canvas of the same street called Les Chaumes du Gré à Chaponval. The good news is we get to turn back now. The bad news is that we are now almost 2 kms from our next stop (22 mins). The good news is there is another way to go.

Turn around and head out of rue de Gré and turn right (that one is also rue de Gré, but don’t think about it). Go to the end at rue Marceau. Turn left and keep walking as the name changes to Parmentier. After four hundred and fifty feet, bear right staying with Parmentier. Keep walking as the name changes to rue François Villon and then rue Carnot, before rejoining rue du Général de Gaulle. Turn right and walk six hundred feet back to the Auberge Ravoux, but then turn left onto rue de la Sansonne. Walk around three hundred and twenty feet to the Musée Daubigny and the tourist office.

Because of Van Gogh's popularity, poor Charles-François Daubigny almost gets the cold shoulder in Auvers-sur-Oise. Ironically, he was the more successful of the two while alive. A leading member of the Barbizon School and of an artistic family, Daubigny may have had some influence on the coming Impressionists. In 1866 Daubigny visited England, eventually returning because of the War in 1870. In London he met Claude Monet, and together they left for the Netherlands.

Back in Auvers, he met Paul Cézanne, another important Impressionist. What a small world it must have been. Vincent painted Daubigny's garden.

Daubigny's Garden by Vincent à deux.

Continue walking for about five minutes (less than a thousand feet). Turn left and you find another Van Gogh painting on the stairs to the church.

Climb the stairs to the Church of Notre Dame of the Assumption. Walk around to the back and turn around. Voilà, another painting.

With your back to the church, turn left and follow the track out between the active fields. The path is so narrow, because the fields rise high on either side, I felt like I was walking in Vincent's footsteps.

I always thought this was his last, but I’ve seen other opinions, and I love it just the same. When we saw the scene in the winter, the fields were wild. In the spring, I imagine, they would be tilled.

Champ de blé au corbeaux (Wheatfield with Crows) by Vincent

Turn around and with your back to the field, there is a dirt road heading away. Follow that road to the end and you will find the cemetery.  You should have no problem finding Vincent’s grave, with brother Theo next to him. It was Theo’s wife who suggested that he be buried with Vincent after he died months later. The ivy there was transplanted from their cottage in Belgium.

Please allow me to add that buried in same cemetery with Vincent is another painter from The Netherlands named Guillaume Corneille. That was September 9, 2010, and I won't go into a bio here, but you should know that he was part of a group of artists called CoBrA, which stood for Copenhagen, Brussels, Amsterdam, from whence their members came. It was the wish of Corneille (as he signed his work) to be laid to rest near the Dutch painter and compatriot he adored.

When you leave the cemetery, turn left and follow avenue de Cimetière to the end. Turn left, go past the church, then turn right onto rue du Montcel, which curves around into avenue de Paris which leads to rue du Général de Gaulle. Turn right and we find the train station on the right. Next stop, le Centre Georges Pompidou. Take the RER A train to Chatelet-Les Halles.

On the way back into the city, I would like to talk a little about Cubism. I know its development has always been confusing to me and certainly this tour has not helped to alleviate that situation. So here goes: In the beginning, there was Braque and Picasso, and they made Art that looked like cubes. They wanted to present their subjects from a great number of perspectives at the same time, resulting in strange fragmented images. There was lots of brown, black, and white. But they were not yet Cubists.

 Still Life with Metronome by Georges Braque, late 1909,

It was at Berthe Weill's gallery in January of 1907, when Jean Metzinger and close friend Robert Delaunay (they exhibited portraits of each other at the Salon d'Automne of 1906) were singled out by the critic Vauxcelles as 'Divisionists,' who used large, mosaic-like 'cubes' to construct their compositions.

                                             Jean                            Two Nudes, Two Women by Jean Metzinger, 1910-11

These new Cubists criticized the work of Picasso and Braque because they felt that it lacked human interest. It was Matisse, by the way, who first used the word "cubes" when describing this new work. Vauxcelles was only too happy to pirate the tag. Then Albert Gleizes met Henri le Fauconnier, who had been experimenting in a similar direction.  In beating a path for themselves, they chose to emphasize the use of color as well as geometry. And since this was the first real exposure of Cubism to the general public, they created a scandal.

                         Abundance by Henri Le Fauconnier, 1910-11,     Nude Model in the Studio by Fernand Leger, 1911-12

The waters from the Great Flood of 1910 had receded when the Salon des Indépendants was held at the Grand Palais.

There Metzinger, Delaunay, Gleize, and Le Fauconnier, were joined by Fernand Léger.  Vauxcelles referred to the group as "ignorant geometers, reducing the human body, the site, to pallid cubes."  But the artists were already thinking about next year.

In the Spring of 1911, Salle 41 was the epicenter of the Salon des Indépendants.  Thanks to Le Fauconnier, his friends hung their Art together.  They became known as the Salon Cubists, to keep them separate from Georges and Pablo.  Juan Gris soon joined in.

Speaking of Picasso and Braque, where were they for these historic exhibitions? The answer is simple: they were under contract to Daniel Kahnweiler who guaranteed them an annual income for the exclusive right to buy their works. He, in turn, sold only to a small, exclusive circle of collectors. His support gave the artists the freedom to experiment.

Now you remember the Puteaux Group, with the Duchamp gang? Let's put them together with the Salon Cubists, and add a few new names like Francis Picabia, Alexander Archipenko, Robert de la Fresnaye, Joseph Csaky, Frantisek Kupka, and Marie Laurencin. Then mix in some mathematics and geometry and you have La Section d’Or (The Golden Section). The name was taken from the theorems of the mathematical proportion of the human figure in the writings of Pythagoras and Leonardo da Vinci.

Their first project was an attempt to adapt Cubism to domestic home décor; the group created ‘Cubist House’ - La Maison Cubiste, which they produced for Salon d'Automne of 1912. The idea was that Cubism could be the next Art Deco.

The facade was designed by Raymond Duchamp-Villon and the interior conceived by the painter and designer André Mare, in collaboration with Cubist artists from the Section d'Or, whose paintings adorned the walls of the two model rooms. Although rather tame, the critics again attacked the work, which insured big attendance.  Cubism didn't take off as a decor trend, but Mare developed camouflage techniques for the army using Cubist methods.

Meanwhile, in Salle 9, there were paintings by all of the above as well as by Picabia, Le Fauconnier, and L'Hote, with sculptures by Kupka, Archipenko, Modigliani, and Csaky.

Nude Descending a Staircase by Marcel Duchamp, 1912
was submitted, but removed at the last minute.

In order to take advantage of the Cubists' presence at Salon d'Automne, la Section d'Or presented a great exhibition at the Galerie la Boétie. Actually, it wasn't a gallery at all, but a furniture store on rue la Boétie. But even though there was plenty of room for the over 200 works display, the crowds were overwhelming for the vernissage on October 9th, just days after the opening of Salon d'Automne. Did you know that 'vernissage' means 'opening night'?

64 rue la Boétie

And while there is lots more to the Cubist story, I just wanted to get you started.  Or you can figure it out with the chart below: We should be arriving at Chatelet any moment now.

Exit the station and find rue Pierre Lescot, outside the East exit, turn left, then right on rue Saint Martin then to rue de Venice and there you are, Centre Georges Pompidou. Take a peak inside the Atelier de Brancusi, and visit the Stravinsky Fountain featuring sculptures by Niki de Saint Phalle with mechanics by her husband Jean Tingley, before you go in.

The Pompidou consists of the Museum of Modern Art and the Museum of Contemporary Art, so plan to spend some time here. Again, the museum is yours to explore and I won't try to guide you through what may or may not be hanging on the wall when you go. There is all kinds of great stuff. If you don't feel comfortable wandering on your own, there are always audio-guides or even guided tours, if you wish.

I was a bit bothered, the first time I was in The Pompidou, by the representation given the American artists. Besides a few Calders, Warhols, and Rauchenbergs, there were two or three Georgia O'Keeffe's (not her greatest) and three by Lyonel Feininger. "Who the hell is Lyonel Feininger?" is a question commonly asked.

The Lovers by Lyonel Feininger, 1916

With a German father and American-German mother, though born in New York City, it is not surprising that Lyonel would spend much of his life in Germany. After training in Hamburg and Berlin, he began doing caricatures for American, French, and German publications. All the while, he was showing his paintings in the Berlin Secession as well as the Salon des Artistes Indépendants in Paris. By the turn of the century he was the leading political cartoonist in Germany.

Lyonel, c 1894

The Chicago Sunday Tribune hired Lyonel to illustrate Wee Willie Winkie's World.  Then in 1906, he inked the Kin-der-Kids, with characters like Sherlock Bones, Strenuous Teddy, Daniel Lobster, Pie-Mouth and Little Japansky. The Tribune publishers envisioned the Kin-der-kids as a relatively sophisticated alternative to the comical, and at times violent, antics of Happy Hooligan and The Katzenjammer Kids, comic strips published in newspapers owned by Hearst and Pulitzer.

Kin-der-Kids

Lyonel with his kids, 1912

Feininger became associated with various German art groups including Die Brücke and Der Blaue Reiter circle (there was no group called Der Blaue Reiter).  Walter Gropius invited him to teach at Bauhaus as the first master at the school in Weimar. That is, until the Nazis closed them down.

(detail) Carvinal at Auteil by Lyonel Feininger

Lyonel's work was declared "degenerate" by the Nazi party and 300 pieces were confiscated. In 1936, he returned to America for the first time in fifty years, never to return to Germany. He painted, he taught, he got heavy into photography, he wrote music for piano and organ, he created a series of murals for the 1939 New York World's Fair. Then he died in NYC in 1956. Now you know who the hell Lyonel Feininger was.

negative of Lyonel's mural on the Marine Transport Building, NY World's Fair, 1939

And just a couple of notes on Alexander Calder. In 1926, Calder moved to Paris, enrolled at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière, and established a studio at 22 rue Daguerre. Three years later, on a trans-Atlantic boat-trip home, Calder met his future wife, Louisa James, grandniece of Henry James. And I should mention that Calder's father was Sterling Calder, a well-known sculptor in Philadelphia; as was his grandfather (also Alexander) who was famous for his sculpture of William Penn which resides atop Philadelphia City Hall.

Sandy

Back in Paris, Calder, called 'Sandy', became friends with a number of avant-garde artists, including Fernand Léger, Jean Arp, and Marcel Duchamp. He got his first solo show for his wire figures at Galerie Billiet. Jules Pascin wrote the preface to the catalog. Then, following a visit to Piet Mondrian's studio, Sandy was "shocked" into fully embracing abstract art.

He experimented with kinetic sculptures, moved by means of cranks and motors, consciously moving away from the traditional notion of the artwork as a static object. It was not until after Marcel Duchamp dubbed his work "mobiles" that Calder began experimenting with suspending the sculpture, letting it be moved by air currents. Now this was a mobile. That was followed by him making self-supporting, static, abstract sculptures, which were named "stabiles" by fellow sculptor Jean Arp.

Sandy and Louisa returned to America in 1933 to settle in a farmhouse they purchased in Roxbury, Connecticut.

When you're done with the Pompidou, go out and turn right, head to rue Rambuteau, take a right. Go about one thousand feet and turn left on rue de Archives and then a right on rue des Quatre Fils. A couple of blocks more to rue de Vielle du Temple, followed by a right onto rue des Coutres Saint-Gervais (you can cut through the park, if you like). Another couple of hundred feet and you are at the Musée National Picasso, with five thousand pieces and Pablo's archives.

I've never been there myself, though I always wanted to see Rousseau's painting of his late wife that Picasso bought. I just have no respect for the man as a human being. Something about locking his girlfriend in the studio while he was gone did not set right with me.

It's a forty five-minute walk (3.5 km) to the next stop, but we will be walking through the heart of the Marais which is chock-full of art galleries, and along the Seine with its bookseller stalls.

Go back out around/through the park, left on rue Vielle du Temple and go all the way to rue de Rivoli. That's about a third of a mile (just under two thousand feet). Turn right, but don't cross Rivoli until we go just past City Hall, where we will bear to the left on rue de la Coutellerie.

Hôtel de Ville, 1871

Hôtel de Ville de Paris has been the seat of the city since 1357. The current building, with a neo-renaissance style, was built on the site of the former Hôtel de Ville which burnt down during the Paris Commune in 1871. They have free temporary exhibitions here. For example, as of this writing the show is: Parisian Nights, which examines Paris by night, from the 18th century to today, featuring over three hundred works including paintings, photographs, movies and archive documents.

Follow la Coutellerie to avenue Victoria, turn left, then go to the other side of the park, and turn left again.  Take place du Chatelet one block to Quai de la Megisserie.  Turn right and go one and one-quarter miles along the Seine. You'll pass Notre Dame and Saint Chapelle on your left, then the Louvre on your right.  At the Place du Carrousel (remember that place?) get off the street and enter the Tuileries or Jardin du Tuileries. (Maillol, etc).  At the far side of the park, you will find the Musée de l'Orangerie.

Since it would not be possible for me to improve on the following description, I am quoting the museum's website:

The Musée de l’Orangerie was originally built in 1852 as a winter shelter for the orange trees destined for the Tuileries Gardens. Over time, the building was used for soldiers, sporting and musical events, industrial exhibitions, and rare painting exhibitions. In 1921, the administration of the Beaux Arts designated l'Orangerie as an annex to the overcrowded Musée du Luxembourg.

About that time, the Prime Minister of France, Georges Clémenceau suggested to his friend Claude Monet, that l'Orangerie was the best location for the artist’s large panel painting proposed as a gift to the French State to commemorate the close of World War I. Monet worked on Les Nymphéas, the water lilies. between 1914 and 1926, and provided specific guidance regarding their installation in special oval rooms. In May 1927, just months after Monet’s death, l'Orangerie was open to the public.

Claude

And here's a great shot of Claude with wife, Camille:

Downstairs is a spectacular collection of Impressionist and Modern Art from the estate of Jean Walter and Paul Guillaume that should not be missed.

Upon exiting the museum you will be looking right at the Place de la Concorde.

That is the seventy-five feet high, Obélisque de Louxor, which was looted from Egypt's Temple of Luxor in 1833.

THE END

This could be the perfect place to end our tour, as we are right across the Seine from where we began. But there are still plenty of places in Paris where art history was made.  So, if you would like just one more thing…

Le Meurice on rue de Rivoli

Alternate Ending No. 1: With your back to the Seine, walk inside the jardin toward rue de Rivoli. When you get to the other side follow the wall to the right, then through a little amusement area, (there is an English manege from 1872) until you come to a gate in the wall. Walk out the gate and across Rivoli. Turn right. Proceed a few feet along the arcade to Le Meurice.

Founded in 1771 and opened in 1815, this is now a five-star hotel with rooms starting at $1,235 per night. Actually, they didn't move here until 1835. And yet, this too was a haunt for the artists of Paris. For at least one, that is. Salvador Dalí spent about one month of each year here for more than thirty years in the old Royal Suite. There were, however, lots of other luminaries who stayed there, from Mata Hari to Bette Midler. Each year they award the Meurice Prize for contemporary art.

Dali on a Harley at Le Meurice, October 24, 1973

And they serve an outrageous afternoon tea in the Dali Room, but I couldn't find the prices on the menu.

Dali walking anteater, 1969

Alternate Ending No. 2:

If you would like still more Art Adventures, then let's cross over toward the obelisk, but only one street, then turn toward the bridge, and cross over the roadway, but not over the bridge.  Did you get that?  Then turn right and go left when the road goes down to the riverside. This is the Port de la Concorde, but you might find another way. Enjoy the stroll back up the river. Even when the roadway ends, continue until you get to the pedestrian bridge and cross the Seine to the Left Bank, but stay on the lower level. Riverside. Find the River Seine and Canal boat-tour. It leaves from 12 Port de Solférino (in front of Orsay) at 9:45 am, returning (if you wish to) at 14:25, two and a half hours each way.

Riding down the Seine, we pass by the Louvre, Notre Dame and historic Ile Saint-Louis (worth going back for a wander-round) before hanging a left into Canal Saint Martin.

You will get a perspective on Paris most do not. Laid back, historic neighborhoods, locks and footbridges. But first, the boat travels through a dimly lit tunnel beneath the site of the Bastille, emerging as a watery boulevard. Destination: Parc de la Villette, to find Claus Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen's Bicyclette Ensevelie.

Claes with Art.

After exiting the boat, stay on the same side of the river Villette and keep walking until you find giant bicycle parts partially buried in the lawn.

Installed in November of 1990, it's great to see a little American humor in this corner of Paris. But that is all the Art there is here. I hope you found it worth the walk. Running right through the middle of the sculpture is an asphalt walkway. Walk on it past the giant red skateboard ramp, then turn left on the path that goes through a bamboo garden and continue for about fourteen hundred feet. We are heading toward La Cité de la musique- Philharmonie. When you reach rue de Jean Jaurès, turn right and walk seventeen hundred feet, past the Port de Pantin and the Ourcq Mètro stops. Turn left at rue d'Hautpoul to the end, then take a left and find the entrance to the park down the street on your right. This is about a twenty-minute walk.

Inside Parc des Buttes-Chaumont, find avenue de la Cascade, which will take you to the Rosa Bonheur Café.

The park, created in 1867, is best-known for its waterfall and Temple de la Sibylle, but I happen to be a fan of Mdlle. Bonheur and the restaurant is kind of funky. Rosa is considered the most famous woman artist of the nineteenth century. A wonderful painter of animals, you might check her out. We are now heading for Cimetière du Père Lachaise.

You have a choice of a twenty six-minute (two km) walk or a thirteen-minute bus ride. They come every twelve minutes. If we are walking, go out of the park the way we came in, then turn right on rue de Criminèe for one block. Go up the flight of stairs on the right, then stay on the left where we find rue des Annelets. Go to the end then turn left onto rue des Solitaires before taking a quick right onto rue de Palestine. Go to the end, then turn right onto rue de Belleville. Then the next left onto rue du Jourdain, which leads to rue des Pyrénées. Walk a long way (thirty-eight hundred feet) until you reach Gambetta. The second spoke is avenue du Père Lachaise.

Once inside the cemetery you are on your own. But there are lots of touts that would love to show you around. Pick up a map before we get here.

The largest cemetery in Paris, Père Lachaise opened in 1804. Among the artists buried there are: Marie Laurencin, Amadeo Modigliani, Jean August-Dominique Ingres, Karel Appel, Rosa Bonheur, Camille Corot, Eugene Delacroix, Max Ernst, Rene Lalique, Camille Pissarro.

And here are the names of other arts luminaries resting here: Edith Piaff, Frederick Chopin, Georges Bizet, Maria Callas, Paul Dukas, Stephane Grapelli, Oscar Wilde, Honoré de Balzac, Colette, Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas, Guillaume Apollinaire, Paul Eluard, Jean de la Fontaine, Molière, Marcel Proust, Jim Morrison, Isadora Duncan, Yves Montand, Sarah Bernhardt, Marcel Marceau, Simone Signoret.

The Real Ending? 

I cannot leave you out here, so where to next? We can catch the No. 61 bus just outside the avenue Principle gate, on the west side of the cemetery.  That will take us to Gare d'Austerlitz on the Left Bank.  Walk up river around five hundred feet to the Jardin Tino-Rossi, where we can see some sculpture along the river and make our way back to Notre Dame.

And while you are in the neighborhood, you might check out le Jardin des plantes where Henri Rousseau went to conjure visions of jungles for his paintings. There is a wonderful manège (carousel) there, for kids only, with all extinct animals.

Although we hit most of them, there are even more possible destinations.

Museums:

Musée Jacquemart-André, 158 boulevard Haussmann, home of Édouard André and Nélie Jacquemart to display the art they collected during their lives. There is no Modern Art here, but it is a beautiful place, with lots of older Art.

Musée Marmottan Monet, 2 rue Louis Boilly, features a collection of over three hundred Impressionist and Post-Impressionist works by Monet (with the largest collection of his works in the world), Berthe Morisot, Degas, Manet, Sisley, Pissarro, Gauguin, Signac, and Renoir.

Musée du quai Branly - Jacques Chirac at 37 Quay Branly Specializes in Arts & Civilizations of Africa, Asia, Oceania and the Americas.

Other potential places of interest:

The Arts et Metiers Métro stop (on Lines 3 and 11) was redesigned in 1994 to look like Jules Verne/Steampunk by Belgian comics artist François Schuiten, and the Viaduct des Arts (1 Coulée verte René-Dumont) shows how Paris utilized the spaces underneath the old train trestle for arts-related businesses.

Chagal dome in Opera Guernier

Fondacion Cartier, 261 boulevard Raspail, presents temporary contemporary exhibitions.

Dali Sundial, 27 Rue Saint-Jacques.  Installed in 1966 at a cermony where Dali rode up on a lift, with his pet ocelot, for some finishing touches while a brass band played below.  The shell face represents the Scallops that mark the Way of Saint Jacque de Compestella.  Some, of course, see it as a self-portrait.  Either way, the sundial doesn't work.

Cimetière Saint Ouens, north of Porte de Clignancourt. Suzanne Valadon is buried here next to her mother. Among those in attendance at her funeral were her friends and colleagues André Derain, Pablo Picasso, and Georges Braque.

Les Marchés aux Puces. While you are at the above cemetery, you will discover acres of flea markets. Hunt for the good ones.

Daytrips:

Giverny - Home of Claude Monet, is northwest of the city, close to an hour and a half, by car, from Paris.

Musée Robert Tatin, in Cossé-le-Vivien, is almost 3 hours from Orsay, but a most unusual experience.

Laval, birthplace and grave of Henri Rousseau, is less than a half-hour from Cossé-le-Vivien. Here is the Vieux-Château, where a statue of Rousseau invites you to visit the Musée d’Art Naïf (Museum of Naive Art). There are three statues of Rousseau, Alfred Jarry, and Père Ubu in front of City Hall.

So, any questions?