Saturday, 7 October, Musée d'Orsay, Le Pré Catelan

Written 1 November 2023

Another timed entry Saturday morning, 10 am at the Musée d'Orsay, the museum of art housed in the old Gare d'Orsay train station on the left (south) bank of the Seine. Its collection covers the period from 1848 to 1914 and therefore encompasses the impressionists.

At the left here is the pleasant mural that loomed before us each day as we approached the entrance to the Pernety metro station. The wall is actually entirely flat and featureless—all the arches and the vignettes they reveal are painted on.

The special exhibition we had come to see covered the last couple of months of Van Gogh’s life, just before he shot himself. He spent that time in Auvers-sur-Oise, under the care of a psychiatrist he got on well with, who was actually an art collector and painter himself. In that 70 days, Van Gogh produced 74 paintings, as well as numerous drawings and sketches. I didn’t count, but they may well have had all 74 there.

Like the Louvre, the d'Orsay has also reorganized its timed-entry system and greatly improved the ticket-purchase website, making it much easier to determine just what each ticket option includes, how to print the tickets, etc. Right on time, we were ushered in, through the now standard x-ray of bags and metal detector system.

I sort of like the cows at the left here, but the vase of flowers at the right doesn't have any of the qualities that draw me to still lives by the impressionists or more realistic painters.

Much was made of the view of the village church at the left. A photo of the actual building appears at the right. They even displayed an entirely white version of it, in which you can see the "ghost" of the painting in faint relief, just in the shape of the thick brush strokes. (That didn't photograph well, even with the low-angle light they bathed it in.)

As you can see, the actual church was pretty rectilinear, despite Van Gogh's portrayal of it.

One whole section of the exhibition was devoted to a series of paintings that were wider than standard—the shape of two side-by-side squares, like this view of fields in the rain (left) and trees at dusk (right). Apparently this format is unusual; perhaps it imposes different constraints on the artist with respect to, e.g., composition.

My friend Rachel (mother of young CJ of my earlier diaries) adores Van Gogh, and I have to say I really like some of his work (like the dried-up sunflowers and antique drawbridge Rachel and I saw together last spring—April 7, 2023), but despite looking at the paintings and drawings, reading the information panels and the excerpts of his letters that covered the walls, I mostly just don't get what he's driving at. Why is everything so bent and twisted? If the impressionists were nearsighted, did Van Gogh have really severe astigmatism? Did he see things that way, or was he trying to express how bent and twisted he felt inside? Did he make "Deux Fillettes" ("Two little girls") look creepily like old women on purpose? Baffling. But I'll keep looking. The impressionists have definitely grown on me; maybe Van Gogh will, too.

We had lunch in the museum's flagship café. At the left is a view of the room where it's located. At the right are the chairs that someone chose to furnish the room with. They came in a variety of reds, blues, and greens, and looked like somebody (apparently made by a prominent Italian artist) melted a bunch of large hard candies together to make them. I wonder if they use Chippendale or Queen Anne chairs in the glass-and-steel cafeteria/snack bar upstairs.

I was still trying to eat light (in anticipation of the evening's tasting menu), so I just ordered an appetizer: braised leeks in miso vinaigrette, marinated salmon, and dill cream cheese. Garnished with tiny pickled radishes and arugula. Scrumptious.

David chose "ravioles de Rohan," little postage-stamp-sized ravioli (though the folks in Rohan protest that, no, they're not "ravioli" they're ravioles!) filled with cheese and chives that we're both fond of. They came in a creamy sauce and were topped with arugula, tomatoes, and half a burrata. They had apparently been under the heat lamp for a while, as the top ones were crispy, but they weren't bad that way!

Following gallery numbers, looking for the enamellers, I wound up walking all the way to the end of the museum's large central space. On the way, I notice a side gallery where a subset of the impressionists, including some works by Renoir, had been temporarily assembled. Mental note to see if David knew about that.

The enamelers turned out to occupy just one small room, and only one piece of actual enamel work, an ornate mantel clock, was present. The rest of the exhibition consisted of drawings of plans for enamel work, which were gorgeous in their own right.

In the 1860's Paul Soyer, an engraver, took to making works in painted enamel "in the Limoges style" and made a name for himself. He got a gold medal at the Universal Exposition of 1878. Around 1889, his son Théophile (trained at the École des Beaux Arts) took over the business, together with his wife and fellow enameler Lucie Dejoux, and they trained up their daughter Jeanne, at an early age, to help in the studio. It was the latter two generations who really got into art nouveau. Works by all of them were represented, but the bulk of the collection was the works of Théophile.

Here are a couple of his designs, at the left a mock-up for an advertisement (entitled "Crépuscule," "twilight"), and at the right designs for a couple of enameled vases.

And here are two more. Gorgeous as watercolors; surely stunning as finished objects.

Because the Soyer exhibition was so small, I was finished there well before I needed to meet David, so I visited a few old friends who lurk back there at the far end. At the left here is a shot down through the glass floor at the wonderful scale model of the Opera neighborhood of Paris. The Opera Garnier building is not actually in this photo.

At the right is "The Architect" by Henri Marcel Magne, himself an architect. The authoritative figure pointing with his cane in the painting is the artist's father, Lucien Magne, who was the best known of the dynasty of architects of which they were both members.

At the left here is an architect's model for a covered food market building.

At the right is a sort of edge-wise view of the cutaway model of the Opera Garnier building. It's incredibly detailed—you can see the long illustrated information panel that explains it. You can also see "The Architect" in the background, behind the spectators.

Also in that back end of the museum is the series of long express escalators that will take you right to the top of the building, so I rode them all the way up to join David in the expressionist galleries.

Prominently featured was this new restoration of an early work by the youthful Monet, "Ladies in the Garden." It's very large, and Monet insisted on actually painting it outdoors, doing first the garden setting, then having the same model (his companion of the time) pose for all three of the ladies on the left side. Because it took so long and had to be carried indoors and out so often, it got torn and was repaired. Unfortunately, the repairs had deteriorated with time, and the varnish had yellowed badly. Modern imaging techniques permitted the Center for Research and Restoration of the Museum of France not only to remove and redo the original repairs but to remove the discolored varnish, revealing Monet's original vibrant colors and subtle shadows.

Nearby was this lovely vase of peonies. Unfortunately, my photo of its label came out so blurry I couldn't read it. But Google (I love Google) came to the rescue. I tried looking it up under Monet and under Renoir (no luck), but just Googling "Louvre vase of peonies" turned it up instantly; it's called "Vase of Peonies," and it's by Manet.

At the left here is Renoir's "Bal du moulin de la Galette," which remings me so strongly of his "Luncheon of the Boating Party." I think the same blue dress with red and white collar appears in both!

And at the right is a work newly acquired by the museum through a program in which art can be surrendered to museum collections in lieu of payment of certain taxes. It's "Sunflowers, Garden at Petit Gennevilliers" by Gustav Caillebotte, depicting his own garden. Caillebotte was actually a buddy of Renoirs. If you Google up an image of "Luncheon of the Boating Party" and look in the lower right corner, the guy straddling a chair in the sleeveless white t-shirt is Caillebotte.

Our dinner reservation that night was at Le Pré Catelan, a Michelin 3-star so rarified that it doesn’t even have a street address. You can't get there by public transport (without walking a good ways through the rather sketchy wooded parts of the Bois de Boulogne, in the dark at this time of year), but it's so well known that Uber was able to work with just "Le Pré Catelan, Bois de Boulogne, Paris."

The waiter saw me taking photos and offered to take one of us. The chandeliers in the room were not especially to my taste, but now that we've been to Venice, I recognize them from my photos as Murano glass.

We ordered the 10-course version of the "Menu du Pré," omitting the second fish course and the caviar, which would have made it 12 courses and considerably raised the price. David treated himself to a premier cru Chablis with the difference between the two prices—he reported it to be superb. The amuse-bouche was this pair of impossibly long, skinny, and fragile Parmesan cheese straws.

First course: sea urchin. A crispy-crusted tartlet of a fluffy cream of sea urchin and Osetra caviar, sprinkled with finely grated lime zest, and balanced on top of the actual (empty) test of an urchin. Yummy. With it, we were served the now apparently standard round loaf of crusty bread with a large disk of salty Breton butter, stamped with the restaurant's name.

Second course: scallop. A thin slice of marinated sea scallop topped with walnut vinegar and smoked mustard. Very mild but good.

Written 11 November 2023

Third course: a miniature bouillabaisse (Provençal seafood soup), with rouille sauce. Unfortunately, I ate it before remembering to take the photo, but you can see from the color of the residue how rich it was. The plate arrived with a dollop of rouille in the bottom, dotted with bits of seafood and, of all things, "slight burned fresh walnuts," so described on the menu. The waiter then poured the smooth bouillabaisse mixture over it. Scrumptious, and the burned walnuts added a definitely delicious flavor note.

Fourth course: crab. In the bottom of the bowl was a wonderfully flavorful crab custard, covered with dashi broth and emulsion of fennel. Outstanding!

Fifth course: ravioli of langoustine with foie gras sauce. I saw on the menu that the dish included gold leaf, which does not play well with my silver amalgam fillings, so I asked if it could be left off my serving. Apparently not, because the fold leaf was crumbled throughout the accompanying aspic. So David's serving included sparkly diced aspic, but mine was surrounded by sliced summer truffle instead.

Seventh course: pigeon. Described as "prepared like a roast," and served with braised beets and a nettle sauce. That's a nettle leaf decorating the plate.

With it came lovely mashed potatoes (shown at the right), flecked with coarsely ground mustard seed and drizzled with sauce from the pigeon.

Eighth course: cheese. The cheese course was a small, hot, steamed cheese soufflé napped with a cream of Comté (a pressed cheese from eastern France). Predessert (not an official course): A delicious sorbet of basil, dill, and preserved lemon, dotted with shards of crisp meringue and drizzled with a fruity olive oil drizzle.

Nineth course: first dessert: Crisp of slices of rhubarb poached in their syrup with vanilla, rhubarb ice cream, a salty crumble, and a disk of crispy sugar with dried rhubarb crumbled over the top.

At the left you see the dessert intact, as it arrived at the table. At the right, I've pried the crispy sugar disk off to reveal the ice cream and crumble underneath.

Tenth course: madère. A little cream puff shell with nut ice cream, vinaigrette, and anise powder. I'm not sure what madère (madeira) had to do with it, unless that's just the name of a pastry of that sort.

Mignardises: two little hazelnut, caramel, and chocolate tartlets, presented on a bed of cocoa nibs (I think).