After we had breakfast together and my friends headed out to catch their trains home, I walked south to the Rue de Rivoli and then east to the Place du Carrousel entrance to the Louvre. Back when I first learned about that entrance, it was a hidden, secret entrance. We had entered through an unmarked door, ventured down a dingy corridor, to some very industrial-looking stairs that weren’t all that well lit. Now it is all well-marked, well-lit, and welcoming. It looks much more like the entrance to a shopping mall than an entrance to a museum.
In the past, whoever I was with and I would be the only people navigating those stairs. This time, there were escalators as well as a wide set of stairs. There were several others going in the way I was and I just fell in with them.
Back in the day, anyone coming in from the Carrousel entrance would just merge at the ticket desk with those coming in from the Pyramid entrance. Now tickets must be purchased in advance. There are also multiple (three or four at various times) entrances which all merge downstairs to get into the museum.
I just continued to follow the others who had come in at the same time as I did as we wound around a few times to get to where everyone merged. Then, after what seemed like a longer walk than what it had taken to get to the museum, we finally got into the entrance line itself. I was quietly waiting for the line to inch along and was taking in all of the changes when a guy came up from behind me and accused me of butting into the line ahead of him.
I explained that I had just come in with all of these other people who were ahead of me and this was where we ended up. He then said that he had come in from the subway, “like everybody else”, but had never seen me until now. When I tried to tell him that there were multiple entrances which all merge there, he said that I was a lying bitch. So, since I choose which fights are worth fighting and which aren’t, I said, “If it means that much to you to go in two seconds ahead of me, go head.” Then I stepped back to let him and the woman who was with him move ahead of me. Unfortunately that didn’t satisfy him.
He just kept after me letting me know what a horrible, entitled person he thought I was. So I motioned for a security person to come over to us. Then I asked him to explain to her what his complaint was. Her response was to explain to him about the multiple entrances all converging where we were and asked me which entrance I had used. I told her and she said to him, “She came in from a different entrance and that was why you didn’t see her until you got here where everyone merges.”
He still wasn’t going to let it go. She pointed out that he was in front of me, so she didn’t understand the problem. He wanted me to be kicked out of the museum. She said to me, “Come with me”. He was a happy man now. He thought she was going to do what he told her to do. She didn’t. Instead she took me in through the security entrance. I thought that was very kind of her and thanked her. She wanted to get me away from him. She also told me that, if he found me and harassed me at any point while I was in the museum, let a security person know immediately and he would be the one tossed out.
As packed as the place was, I had already decided to start with some areas other than where the big crowds would likely be going first and then say “Hi” to Mona later. I headed for the excavations under the Cour Carrée, which is surrounded by the Sully Wing. This is where the base of the towers and the drawbridge supports of the fortress of King Philippe-Auguste can be seen.
This is the oldest part of the Louvre, which began construction in roughly 1190. The oldest portion of the palace still above ground, which dates from the late 1540s, is known as the Lescot Wing. It is the part of the Sully Wing that is on the western side of the Cour Carrée. It was built by King Francis I.
When I went up to the Ground Floor I was inside that part of the palace. The official Louvre website has an interactive map of the museum. One can click on a room and see what it contains. Also, if you want to visit a particular piece of art, you can enter its name and it will tell you the wing, floor and room number. Very handy for advance planning. I had my basic route figured out in advance, subject to any changes due to crowds or fatigue.
I crossed into the Denon Wing to visit the Dying Slave and Rebellious Slave sculptures by Michelangelo and Psyche Revived by Cupid’s Kiss in Room 403. Then I returned to the Sully Wing to check on Venus de Milo before moving on to the Egyptian Antiquities in the eastern part of that wing. When I had last been there, I had not yet been to Egypt. So I was even more interested in them now, especially both Horus (I had visited a couple of his temples) and the Seated Scribe. The Seated Scribe was up one floor from where I was, but there was plenty to explore on the Ground Floor before moving up to the 1st Floor. There were several more rooms full of Egyptian artifacts on that floor too.
Returning to the Denon Wing, I viewed the Winged Victory of Samothrace before moving on to the paintings. This was where the museum really became crowded.
I had some favorite paintings in both rooms 702 and 700 which I visited before venturing into Room 711, which was where Leonardo da Vinci’s ultra-famous Mona Lisa was located. Patience is definitely needed to be able to catch a quick glimpse of her. She is by far the most popular attraction in the entire Louvre.
In Room 702, the Death of Marat has always interested me because I was once in a production of the play “Marat Sade”, which was based upon the death of Jean-Paul Marat. The character I played had originally been a priest in a straight jacket representing the real life priest Jacques Roux. We changed the character to a nun. The habit I wore was real as was the straight jacket. I needed to trust that they would actually let me out of it.
The painting of the Coronation of Napoleon in the same room depicts Napoleon crowning Josephine by the altar of the Cathedral of Notre Dame de Paris. In the upper right can be seen the Pieta just behind the altar. She same Pieta my friends and I sat in front of during our visit to Notre Dame earlier in the week.
I had debated skipping seeing the Mona Lisa this time as enormously large crowds are not at all something that I enjoy. But it would have been like not saying “hi” to an old friend (we first made our acquaintance in 1984). So I took a deep breath and waded into the fray. Yes, she is worth seeing – whether for the first time or the seventh.
Emerging unscathed from that room I ventured over to the Richelieu Wing to visit the apartments of Napoleon III. These aren’t merely decorated rooms that have been set up in the Louvre. These are the actual rooms created during the time of Napoleon III in the Second Empire (1852-1870) as state rooms for the use of the Minister of State (whose family occupied private rooms nearby) to hold receptions, dinners, masked balls, etcetera. They have survived miraculously mostly intact for over 150 years and have been open to the public since 1993. I had only seen them once before in 2000, so wanted to take a better look at these rooms this visit. They are quite sumptuous.
The photo that I have of the Salon Theatre is quite interesting for a couple of reasons. The room can be converted from a salon to a theatre relatively easily. The piece of furniture that can be seen in the center front of the photo is a chair made for three people to sit together closely for a private conversation.
From there, I took the stairs down to the Cour Marly, which was created in 1993 when this portion of the Louvre Palace was integrated into the museum. It had been an open courtyard which was then covered with a glass ceiling and the entire space temperature-controlled. Then it was filled with monumental sculptures from the gardens, fountains and groves of a leisure residence of King Louis XIV at Marly, near Versailles. These had been scattered all over Paris after the destruction of the royal residence. Since 1993 they have been housed together in this glorious space. The beautiful Marly Horses are displayed at the top level of the courtyard.
Next time –The Marvelous Musée des Arts Décoratifs
