blog d'europe: modern art

still in venice, but i thought this part of our visit deserved its own post. the peggy guggenheim collection is a modern art gallery made up of the american art collector, peggy guggenheim's personal collection of works.
she acquired a heap of works that she viewed as the most important art from the first half of the 20th century. lots of surrealism & cubism - max ernst, henri magritte, joan miró, man ray and even a salvador dali painting.

the collection had a garden filled with modern sculptures including this impressive mirror & glass triangular prism that was a real life optical illusion. so trippy..

the garden is also home to venice's wish tree (the brainchild of yoko ono, titled 'to peggy with love x'), where visitors are invited to jot down a wish onto a slip of paper, then attach it to tiny branches of the tree. a novel concept with a magical effect - the hundred's of little pieces of paper all ripple in the breeze. we had a cheeky stalk of everyone's wishes. some were deep & meaningful: 'paix sur la terre', some were fun: 'to fly' and some were just.... odd: 'puppy'.

i'd definitely recomend a visit to peggy guggenheim if you're in venice. it's a refreshing break from all the dramatic venetian paintings & it's in a really peaceful corner of venice - the sestière of dorsoduro. it's right near the santa maria della salute church.

arrivederci ...(can't say that without imagining brad pitt in inglorious basterds),

S.

i stumbled upon this great modern art gallery/museum in the 16th arrondissement today. it's next to the palais de tokyo, m^o alma-marceau.

it has galleries dedicated to henri matisse & raoul dufy, as well as an immense permanent collection of cubist, fauvist, abstract & dada works from the 20th century. the best thing? free, gratuit, gratis, gratuito!

except for the temporary exhibits of marc desgrandchamps & van dongen...although somehow i still managed to see these exhibitions without buying a ticket. new motto: just walk in without asking questions and they will be none the wiser.

my fav work was tucked into a small gallery downstairs, in a simple room that looks like a library with bookshelves covering all the wall's surfaces. it's not until you get closer to the books that you notice they're categorised alphabetically by country, and that the books are telephone directories from every country in the world. naturally i made a bee-line for australie, and i can't explain to you how bizarre it was to see melbourne's yellow pages l-z sitting there in front of me. the concept behind the installation by christian boltanski, is to question the nature of 'identity' and to reflect how small the world is - 'to have the whole world in one room'. the other strange aspect of this artwork, is that you can literally interact with it; pick up the heavy books and flick through the pages - no doubt to encourage viewers to find their own names in his installation... great concept, love!

i love finding little gems like this gallery. paris is full of them, you just have to keep your eyes open while wandering around and you never know what you might come across...

bon week-end à tous,