To say I was excited about my visit to the Louvre is an understatement. Since I was a little girl I’ve loved museums and the Louvre was the ultimate. I’ve heard that you can’t fully explore it in a day but a few hours in the morning was all I had and I was happy with that. After a lovely pastry-laden breakfast (that’s another thing to blog about) I was off to the Louvre with my Ate Tess.
After getting our audio guides we went on to discover the different collections. It would’ve been easy to get sidetracked because of the many interesting things inside but the audioguide’s thematic trail kept us on track.
When I saw the Venus de Milo at the far end of a hallway, people clustering around her, I was reminded of a small replica we had in the living room when I was younger. Unlike our decor this one was a tall and powerful statue of a woman, standing in all her Greek glory, still so beautiful and ethereal though incomplete. The audioguide advised to take a look at Venus from different angles, making us understand certain details about it that can easily escape the viewer.
Atop a grand staircase was Nike or The Winged Victory of Samothrace, towering above everybody. It was a regal greeting to visitors who took the steps.
If I detailed every single masterpiece we saw, I would run out of words and space to describe how awe-inspiring they all are. I marveled at the paintings I never thought would come alive from the art and humanities books I’ve read in the past. There was so much to see and learn that we inched our way to the star of the Louvre. We were minutes away from the woman whose smile remains as mysterious as on the day she was made.
There was a huge crowd forming in the big hall where grand paintings covered the tall and wide walls. Everyone was edging to the far side where a big wall contained only one painting much smaller than the others in the room. There she was, the Portrait of Lisa Gherardini more popularly known as the Mona Lisa. I slowly made my way to the front of the cord that separated me from the painting. I took a good look at the woman in the frame. I wish I could say that she looked more stunning in person but of course she looked exactly like the photos in books. My anticipation somehow made me expect that. But as I looked at the colors, the lines, the whole picture, I realized the difference I was looking for-a sense of history, and that was what I got. It felt different to see a work of art the whole world knows, to have before me a creation by a genius who was ahead of his time. I had a piece of time frozen before me not just with the Mona Lisa but with every single object that had a story in that museum.
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If I lived in Paris, I’d probably spend every weekend exploring a different part of the Louvre. I had seen only a fraction of the numerous collections they had inside and enjoyed every bit of the experience. Maybe someday I’ll go back, walk the museum halls, and discover more ancient stories that only the artifacts can tell.
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