An Evening at Centre Pompidou

If in Paris and feeling in the mood for some modern art, the Centre Pompidou is the place to go. The vast art gallery houses many big names in modern art and often has groundbreaking exhibitions. The Dali exibit has been on for months and I have been meaning to go and check it out. A few weeks ago a friend and I finally found a time to see it. Pictures are below: 

Here is a view of the boulevard from the window of the 1st floor of the museum. Have you ever wondered why Paris' facade and buildings are so uniform and similar? The style you can see below is what is known as "Haussmanian". After the French Revolution and during the Empire, Napoleon had the architect Haussmann completely re-invent the city. A lot of monumental pieces of history were destroyed and many buildings like the ones below were built. This was meant to re-create Paris as an aesthetically uniform and beautiful city. While many around the world marvel at the beauty of Parisian facades, there is still some resentment about their creation. This is because Napoleon was not careful about keeping century-old history around, and thus Paris only has a handful of buildings that date back to antiquity left.

 

Anyways...On to the museum! 

Here is my friend Siobhan playing in the interactive art:

 This was meant to be a couch!:

 Myself with Andy Warhol's Elizabeth Taylors:

 Manet:

 Kandinsky:

 Chagall's "Les Maries de la tour Eiffel"...shows married couple in front of the Eiffel tower:

 Picasso:

 Another view of the city at night time:

 The Salvador Dali Exhibit:

 Surrealism at its finest:

 Siobhan and I sitting in the lips of a recreated Dali work:

 

And a delicious Falafel dinner to end the night..."L'As de Falafel" is one of my best discoveries in Paris...It is in the Marais, the Jewish quarter and is absolutely delicious! The restaurant has even been visited by Lenny Kravitz!