Classical in springtime...

Coming off of spring break

and back into real life. It's no easy task.

I spent a really lovely, relaxing week in Madrid and Valencia with a few old friends. We sat in the park, drank wine, and played cards while watching the sunset over a gorgeous horizon. We searched out croquettas at midnight and learned how to salsa from some really nice South Americans. It was all so great. Now I'm bit sick (traveling and over-exertion does that, I hear). I came back only to be faced with a stressful ending to the most relaxing semester I've ever had. I am determined to make time to enjoy Paris in spring and not let finals get the best of me, though. There is still so much I want to do in this city...

I'm heading out to see Noah and the Whale tonight!

On another note...

really cute bathing suits!
by Zimmermann, sold at Urban Outfitters.

On being culturally well-read

and why we can't know everything. Damn I love NPR!

This article speaks to my innermost overachiever. The girl who tried to read a book a week at age 7. The girl who tried to read a book a week, for a summer, at age 15 (and succeeded this time.) The girl who can't get enough music, even if it means her computer is starting to give notifications of an almost-full hard drive. The girl who tried dancing, who tried piano lessons, who tried the saxophone, who sings in the shower. Who tried to make herself completely ambidextrous in pre-K. Who makes lists of movies to see, people to look up on wikipedia, and who learned French just because it sounds beautiful.

Sigh.

Yet, I persist. My new favorite paintings, seen at the Magritte museum in Brussels. I like his work so much more than I thought I did.

L'Empire des lumières, 1954

La Magie noire, 1935

Update

I'm sitting home in Paris taking a petite pause until later on when I'll be boarding a bus to Brussels for the weekend. Last week was spent in Spain: Zaragoza and Barcelona. I took 8 rolls of film. I swear this blog will be so much more interesting and up-to-date once I have a scanner at my disposal again.

Here are some paintings I saw in Barcelona at the Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya. This museum is unlike any other I've ever been to. It's very Catalunya-specific, but the variety therein is incredible. The 19th and 20th century paintings by obscure artists that you don't learn about in AH101 were just phenomenal. They're potent enough to remind anyone why art in general, as a practice, is so brilliant.

Joaquim Mir, Poble escalonat, 1909

Joaquim Sorolla, Retrats d'Elena i Maria amb vestits valencians antics, 1908

Lluís Masriera, Ombres reflectides, 1920

Ramon Casas, La mandra, 1898-1900

Ramon Casas, Primero pasarás sobre mi cadáver, 1893

And last, but certainly not least, Picasso's Los Pichones series (located at the Museu de Picasso in Barcelona, also a 'must' if you're in town.)

More to come on Courbet and his influences.

on a musical note (ha! pun intended)...

I have a really neat book at home in NY called Conversation Pieces: Poems that Talk to Other Poems, and I've been thinking lately that it would be cool if a publication existed in the same vein but for music. There's probably something out there already, but either way I'd like to make my contribution:

When mom comes to town...

My mom came to visit me in Paris for a week. It was totally wonderful having her here, showing her my favorite neighborhoods, stores, boulangeries... I could go on. The highlight of the week for me was our day trip to Versailles. We took an audio tour of the chateau, which was super interesting. The weather was perfect, the gardens had bloomed, and I shot many rolls of film. We went to Marie Antoinette's private chateau, Trianon, and rented bikes to get there (my suggestion). My last adventure on a bike ended, well, badly. But as they say, it always comes back to you right? Like riding a bike? Right.

My mom and I were laughing from the moment we got on the bikes because this usually isn't our thing. So I found my balance and went. It was super fun, and I got a sweet rush of something great... until 40 feet later when I had to navigate between two very close posts and realized I was moving a lot faster than I thought. So as you can imagine, this is when I crashed. I was fine, and I got right back on, laughing all the while (and listening to my mom laugh AT me as she kept riding, because this is just so me: to fall off a rented bike when it was my idea in the first place). I didn't fall on my bag so my cameras were fine. Funnily enough, I got a big bruise on my knee and skinned it right where I have a scar from falling off my bike when I was 8 years old. This was the first of many, apparently.

I picked up the rolls taken with my Diana F+ from the lab today, and they came out all right. I'm waiting until I get home to have any prints made, as the prices are pretty elevated here. I actually am looking forward to reliving Paris during the summer through having all the prints made... scanning them, spending time with them. It's a good thing.

Here are some newbies. Click the picture to be transported to my flickr.

I can't believe how wonderful the light is at the end of the day here. It makes a thing like wet laundry look glorious.

Springtime in music

This week turned out to be my annual celebration I like to call "Catherine's springtime love affair with great music"! Every year when the temperatures rise after cold and dreary winters, I swear music just sounds different. Better, even. Some of my favorite videos from this week...

The secret show Arcade Fire played in Haiti. Looks like fun, right?

My good friend Matt Sucich (sue-sitch) debuted his new album Jubilation and Jealousy at Joe's Pub on March 26! This is a new song not on the record. You can find the record and other recordings of him on Bandcamp and iTunes, all linked on his website above. Fancy!

The Bewitched Hands on the Top of our Heads performed "Hard to Cry" for La Blogothèque (up there with Daytrotter for one of the best music collaboration ideas ever). This sesh was recorded in Reims, France. The end is just... SO good.

EDIT:

This one too. It's been a favorite for some months, but lately it's really hitting home.

My list

I'm making a list of things to do in New York upon my return. I have a feeling it's going to be an amazing summer... but right this very moment I'd like to teleport to the Met and stare at this painting. It's one of my favorites, and I miss standing in front of it for minutes upon minutes.

In my search for the photo (which doesn't do the work justice; in real life the painting takes up a whole wall), I came across an interesting essay by Mona Hadler that discusses this painting and some other key works of Manet's œuvre. As I'm almost positive it's copyright infringement to copy/paste an academic publication in my ho-hum blog, here's the link to the PDF/JSTOR citations, etc.

Édouard Manet, Woman with a Parrot, 1866

Clementines sunshine printemps

and this.

I had a wonderful weekend, and I'll be back to tell all about it as soon as I finish my film research paper.