"Paris la belle" is the name of the exhibition held at the Hôtel de Ville retracing the work of Jacques Prévert, including photo collages, screenwriting and poetry . Unfortunately I couldn't go. Actually, that's a lie! I would have gone if there wasn't, everyday, that huge line at the entrance that reminded me the one when the first Mc Donald's opened in Russia! Too cold to be outside waiting!!! Looking at the billboard hanging on the wall it was already a very surreal momentum, with the lights of the beautiful building giving the ultimate touch to it!
Museum: the nest of cultural journeys. A place to view. A place to interpret. A place where reality assumes a different image. An image that is ultimately up to us to read and understand with our personal interpretations, associations and rememberances. But yet, the museum, it is also a world of consumption. After I go through the museum spaces, no matter in what city I find myself in, I end up first at the museum café and then inside the museum store and/or bookstore. The "psychological-trip" inside a musuem is very tiring. You wander through spaces and images / objects / sculptures trying to interpret and define whatever message the artist is trying to express. A message about screwed up society, about history, about politics, about nothing at all! Sometimes the the dual realationship between actor and spectator becomes a blurred entity. And I start thinking about who is in fact the real actor??? The piece of art stealing our curiosity or us, the viewers, trying to make sense all we see??? I need coffee really bad! And also a cigarette! But no smoking anywhere!!! Well, I just drink my tiny espresso and write down my thoughts. I ultimately end up at the store. The place where art becomes consumerism. Books, watches, t-shirts, mugs, rings, notebooks and even artsy shoes become the missing piece of the "culture-momentum-day" puzzle. People buy. No matter what. And they all go back to their hotel happy. With their museum bag, which is, for some, as fascinating as the Bloomingdale's small brown bag!
