Orsay Museum

The Orsay Museum It was raining heavily the day we visited the Orsay museum. The line at the entrance was long and we were all soaked by the time we were able to enter but we knew that it was worth the wait. We were all excited to see the very famous impressionistic paintings housed in this museum. Although I had been there before, I could not help but be amazed by the way a beautiful train station had been transformed into a marvelous museum. On level 0, we are able to see the paintings before the impressionistic movement. We began by entering room one where we were able to see paintings by the neoclassical painter Jean August Dominique Ingres. In that same room, we were able to see paintings from someone who greatly paved the way for the impressionistic painters, Eugene Delacroix. After this, we went to room 18 where we were able to admire the paintings by the artist Paul Cezanne. On level 2 of the museum, we were able to see paintings by the artist Vincent Van Gogh and Georges Seurat. I was deeply impressed by Pointillism. It was not until you came close to Seurat’s painting The Circuit that you realized that the shapes were being formed by thousands of dots. The room where Van Gogh’s paintings are located was filled with people and this made it really hard to truly take a look at the paintings and appreciate them. My favorite one was the Church of Auvers since I feel the darkness of the sky transmits Van Gogh’s mental illness. In my opinion, the best pieces of artwork are found in the fifth level of the museum. In this floor we can see the paintings by Edouard Manet, Edgar Degas, Auguste Renoir, Clade Monet and Gustave Caillebotte. Towards the end of the hall, you could find the very famous Luncheon on the Grass by Monet. When this painting was created in 1866, it created a lot of controversy. This was not due to the fact that the women where naked but because the respectable men of a high class were portrayed doing something that was not honorable. In that same floor we can find Monet's Coquelicots, which portraits a bourgeois walking through flowers on an afternoon. This was a great difference from what artists used to portray. Up until then it was really rare to see a painting that were not of religious or mythological stories or at least of an aristocrat. My favorite painting found in this floor was one by Caillebotte. Robotteur de Parque portrays the working class as they perform a task that would not be considered elegant. What I love about this painting is the way the light seems to go through the back window and shine on the floor and on the backs of the workers, it seems like a photograph was taken. The shadows and light on the canvass are what make the painting so impacting to me.