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Creative Dissonance

Learning to be a critical thinker, looker, and do-er.

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Notes on Art

The Unofficial Guide to Viewing a Monet

I got lost in Paris and ended up surrounded by water lilies.

7 min readAug 10, 2023

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A few years ago I did a three-week multi-country tour of Europe. It was the trip of a lifetime that I’m determined to repeat again and again.

If you asked me where I was most excited to go prior to the trip, I definitely would’ve told you the Louvre. However, in a twist of events, on my one full day in Paris, I didn’t make it there.

There’s an embarrassing story there that starts with a bee flying up my shorts, a dash around the city trying to translate the appropriate word for Benadryl in French and ends with me in the basement of the Musée Marmottan surrounded by the most ginormous paintings I’d ever seen.

Monet paintings.

Water Lilies and sailboats and Parisian landscapes and gorgeous blurry bridges. Gloriously colored paintings I had only ever seen in books and art history classes.

It was so breathtaking that instead of visiting the Louvre, I allowed myself to stay in the moment and spend the day with Monet.

Viewing a Monet is not like viewing other works of art.

Creative Dissonance
Creative Dissonance

Published in Creative Dissonance

Learning to be a critical thinker, looker, and do-er.

Adrienne Grimes
Adrienne Grimes

Written by Adrienne Grimes

A writer and a reader of all the things. Follow her on Instagram @bookaweekproject and catch her social media and branding classes in the Ninja Writers Guild.

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