Paris Is in the Details: Review
As will by now be clear, his Paris, though most often in perfect repair, is not so much a deserted as an abandoned city. To that extent, it is closer to Persepolis or to Fatehpur Sikri than to the Paris that most visitors remember. But this is not to say that "Metropolitain" is a diminutio...
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| Published in: | New York Times 1994 |
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| Main Authors: | , |
| Format: | Review |
| Language: | eng |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | Get full text |
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| Summary: | As will by now be clear, his Paris, though most often in perfect repair, is not so much a deserted as an abandoned city. To that extent, it is closer to Persepolis or to Fatehpur Sikri than to the Paris that most visitors remember. But this is not to say that "Metropolitain" is a diminution of Paris, or a likeness from which all energy has been drained. On the contrary, by forcing us to see it in terms of architectural details, rather than of multifarious human activity, Mr. [Matthew Weinreb] gives us a Paris that fairly crackles with formal energy. In terms of location, his Paris will have surprises even for the veteran visitor. How many of us would identify the tilework from a housing development on the Boulevard de l'Hopital? Or the tower of the steam laundry on the Avenue Jean-Jaures? Or the brick and mosaic war memorial on the Art Nouveau church of St.-Jean l'Evangeliste? Or the sundial on the Chapelle St.-Louis de la Salpetriere, with its unsmiling intimation of approaching death? In the iconography of tourism, these must surely rank as "firsts." "Metropolitain" is not a dictionary of oddities. Its underlying lesson for us is that for 500 and more years Paris has almost always had perfect pitch in matters of exterior ornamentation. Mr. Weinreb can spot the absolute rightness of a brass doorbell on the Rue de Seine or a heavy, studded wooden 16th-century door on the Rue Beautreillis. He can also spot the rightness of scale in the words "Lefevre-Foinet," on the Rue Brea, which have so long been synonymous with paint and canvas for the best painters in Paris. |
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| ISSN: | 0362-4331 |