A Trick of the Eye

I’m pretty sure that the first day after arriving in Paris, one is meant to climb the stairs of the Arc de Triomphe or ride the elevator up at the Eiffel Tower, perhaps take in the sights from the Seine on the Bateaux-Mouches or enjoy a cup of coffee at the brasserie. We didn’t do any of that. Well, we tried to but the two sets of tired, jet-lagged feet with us had very different opinions. So instead, we found ourselves climbing the steps of the Grand Palais for their exhibit on Leandro Erlich’s artwork.

He was a new name to all of us. What we knew….I had seen a post somewhere that suggested he created illusions with his artwork. Sounds interesting. Seems worth a try.

And was it ever! This wasn’t art to be looked at, but art to become a part of. As we entered, we were asked to be the “actors” in the art. We were drawn into the art - illusions of gently swaying boats in the water, when there was no water at all; found clouds captured display cases, walked into elevators where you found another person reflected back at you in the mirror and wandered through dressing rooms where walls appeared to be another room and other rooms appeared to be walls. The too-tired feet we had brought with us found their bounce again, as they got lost in the artwork.

But they had saved the best for last - the opportunity to play Spiderman on a Parisian building. If you could climb on the side of a building, what would you do? Lucy - she tucked herself into the highest dormer window she can find; Piper - back walkovers down the side of the building; Dan - hang upside down from the gutters.

And perhaps that was exactly what we needed on our first day in Paris. Not the postcard version of Paris I had imagined, but something unexpected, playful, and a little bit surreal.