"Notre Dame" translates as "Our Lady" and refers to the Virgin Mary.
There isn't too much to say about the place - it's a giant church.
The main entrance, on the west-facing side.
The building of the cathédrale, commissioned by Bishop Maurice de Sully, began in 1163AD, during the reign of Louis VII.
The French Gothic architecture outside and the paintings, stained glass windows, sculptures all reference the naturalist movement in art, which is seemingly more secular and divergent from other traditional religious Romanesque structures (like the Cathedrale of Saint-Front in Périgeux, built around 1150 AD).
There was also this strange ambient music inside that seemed to come from somewhere other than the church itself. There were more tourists than anywhere else I'd been so far - it was a merging point for a lot of different cultures.
As I mentioned in the last post, our first assignment was on the "Public Paris". At Notre Dame, I photographed mainly people, but I tried to take a few of the other surroundings as well.
These are some of my favorite portraits;
I wish I had used a smaller aperture and included the structure itself in this photo, as well as focused closer on the man's eye and hunch back, because he was obviously pulling the whole Quasimodo look, and trying to get sympathy from those coming out of the cathédrale.
This guy was doing the same as the other guy - begging for a bit of sympathy as people were exiting. He saw me taking photos of tourists and him and other beggars, and must have thought I was something other than a tourist, because he winked at me as if we were sharing a secret and said "Ca va?" I stared back at him for a minute, shrugged, and said, "Eh, ca va bien." and went back about my business.
Crazy French goth kids singing Metallica -("Enter Sandman", specifically.)
Some accordian players on a bridge on the Seine, as seen on the walk back to the Metro station.
1 comments:
A little elf! Isn't she lovely?
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