My new friend Dali

I had chosen the previous evening. Dali or Picasso – which museum in Paris to visit? A difficult choice. By choosing one, for the morning, and booking my ticket online, I gave myself a track to run on. Ave Foch, then DaliParis, then Ritz Paris – enough for a morning and perhaps more.

Enough structure to give my potentially anxious self sufficient certainty. Picasso in the afternoon, a possibility, unnecessary additional structure though. What I’m doing now, what I’m doing next. Without having an intimidating route march with specific timings, I have a gentle plan with immense appeal for me. With scope, also, as I could choose the timings and the means of getting to each, according to whatever criteria suited me.

I wandered along the Eastern side of Ave Foch, initially to take it all in as I had noticed so little when I visited previously in 2012. Getting back up from the ground, having sat with my post race goodie bag, is one of the most seared memories from Marathon de Paris 2012. Getting down to the ground was an easy task, as gravity lent its consistent helping hand to my weary self. Getting back up, some minutes later, after I had lain flat out on my back (which hurt a lot) and my side (which hurt a lot). This was an immense effort, as gravity seemed to have drawn all vestiges of energy away to another place, not there with me.

Eight years later, I was able to walk Ave Foch and appreciate what it is – one of the finest addresses in the world, with gardens on both sides, from Porte Dauphine to the Arc de Triomphe. Security was evident everywhere beside me as I walked towards the Arc, from walls and fences and cameras and gates to darkened windows to armed guards. Intense, yet fitting, in this most imposing address. Little chance of finding a Cafe along here or its immediate side streets, as I sought a second morning caffeine fix to soothe my energised self.

Close to the Arc, I found Les Marecheaux on Rue de Presbourg, in time for a bathroom trip and “Cafe au Lait s’il vous plait”. The Gallic welcome was softened by my ordering in French, and a little more as I chose a croissant from the basket on the counter, with a €2 coin moving in reverse from my change in front of me. Strong flavoursome bitter coffee, full fat milk, as good a coffee as I was to find in Paris during my trip.

This was a welcome rest, still little past 0900 on my Champagne Day. Powerful emotions, more so as they were unexpected, had been draining me since standing in traffic at the end of Ave Foch. There, standing, seeing the Arc as I had fleetingly in my finishing dash at Marathon de Paris 2012. Why this meant so much? Some days later, a fellow Eurostar traveller described to me how he considered that I had run the marathon in 2012, and finished it here in 2020. Completeness, now that my running is done, and I run no more. Wholeness from this completeness, as I begin to realise somewhere deep inside that the letting go remember applies to me, letting go to create space, letting go for memory and remembering. This applies to me.

Au revoir, Monsieur, in response to my Merci beaucoup, as I departed, having rested and renewed and written a little in my journal. Onwards from here, meandering in the emerging sunshine and playing with selfies. What are my different looks, moods, attitudes? Can I capture them, see them, express them, in visible ways? Different backgrounds, the Arc, shrubbery, sky, hat on and off, scarf on and off, trying different smiles. Little evident difference between the various selfies taken, work for another day perhaps. Capturing myself, at play, in Paris. That’s good enough, I smile, and continue to the Metro station. Destination Pigalle, from Charles de Gaulle – Etiole, on Line 2, then the walk up to Montmartre. I’m expecting some steep steps if its similar to when I walked up to Sacre Coeur back in 2009.

In the Metro station, I find Line 2, having accidentally misdirected myself and a tourist into the underground access for the Arc itself. This has unnerved me a little, as did my misreading of the signage on entering the metro station, and I took a little while to get my bearings then find Line 2. I’m uncertain about going the correct direction, realising this uncertainty as I step on the train. Looking at the line map and the lights, I remain uncertain, and resolve this as I tell myself the next station will provide evidence if I’m justified or not. The next station is Ternes, so I’m going the right direction. Relief floods, countering the present and patient anxiety, shrinking it slowly and steadily.

I’m quickly on the narrow and steep streets that climb to Montmartre, once I gather my bearings on Boulevard Clichy and take the correct street from Pigalle Metro. Looking back now, any street that went uphill would have been good enough. I didn’t realise that at the time. I wanted to “get it right” after my uncertainty on the Metro. Walking up Rue Houbon, a street reminiscent of walking up to Taksim Square from Besiktas last September. Similar steepness, some small shops, some residential tall buildings and sense of difference. On past Abbesses Metro, Rue la Vieuville, steps, Rue Drevet, past La Taverne de Montmartre, more steps, then I see the square of Place du Tertre and am drawn there. I should have turned left before the Place for Dali Paris; this matters little as I am early for my 1000 timed ticket and the museum opens at 1000 also. Seeing the iconic painters and cafe lined square is a tonic, life is here in many ways, tourists and artists and many more, in genteel harmony. Well dressed sellers of tours and art and gallery visits mingle with artists and those posing; more money than artistic integrity being exchanged for sittings and paintings and scenes and portraits.

Back a few short steps to the Place de Calvaire, then onto Rue Poulbot, where Dali Paris sits beside some small-scale fenced off construction work. I’m early, one of only a few such early birds it seems. As I look around and absorb the views, distant perspectives of Paris appear, looking south across to Montparnasse and beyond, in light and air that are unclear. And, I’m quietly excited about my choice. Here, art centre of historic Paris, Montmartre, where so much talented genius lived, caroused, created, were. Dali, next.

Friendly welcome as the doors open on time, at 1000. The troupe of schoolkids who appeared a few minutes earlier then were led away is nowhere to be seen, and two ladies who were outside before me are not visiting the museum. Excitement building, anticipation, reminiscent of a marathon start line in gentle ways, less hardship ahead, perhaps as much stimulation. Less planning, less preparation perhaps? Or, maybe far more. This trip to Paris has been much of my lifetime in its genesis, and it is here. The time for this has come, and my new friend Dali awaits.

While Salvador Dali is widely recognised as an artist, genius, surrealist, showman – it is his relationship with time and the concept of a “soft watch” which fire my imagination today. It became one of his signature images, in many guises, throughout his career. For Dali, time was flexible and fluid and multi directional, having a different set of characteristics for every individual. Challenging the orthodox and fixed world views, flexible time was able to bend. Stories are told of how his image of the “soft watch” used in so many paintings were inspired by a camembert melting in the summer sun.

This excites me as I consider time to be multi directional. Past, present, future – all connect and flow inexorably together, mixing my past actions and future possibilities to influence what I do and see and feel and experience now. Time connects, always, and not in linear ways, not even in curved ways. In so many ways. I am who I was, who I am, and who I can be. I will become who I was, and I was who I am, who I will become. Interconnected, inextractable, inextricable.

Dali’s elephant also comes into my heart and my spirit. It is also ever present, in sculpture and paintings. The great power of the elephant, its majesty, atop spindly mosquito legs. Clash of past and future, clash of orthodoxy and surrealism, connected to each other and the world around. How his work was always a pathway, a route to another insight or expression, never finished as they never set out to be something permanent.

The strapline for Dali Paris, in their advertising, states “Looking is Inventing” and I feel this, to my core. Exiting the museum through the gallery, I photograph a “soft watch” and the two dimensional image does it no justice. Aha! Inspiration, invention for me. I video the soft watch. A video of time, a creation, only 11 seconds long, yet capturing the concept so much more impactfully than a photograph. Maybe I have found then cover image for Listening, I think.

It is only now, some weeks later, that I realise how Dali has become a friend. Still a tentative friendship, kindled from some awareness of the artist in my childhood and an unintended encounter when I visited Museo Reina Sofia in Madrid recently. Unintended as my sole purpose of visiting was to see the immense permanent exhibition of Guernica, and I came across a section of Dali’s work when I had finished with Picasso.

Kindling, a new friendship, a connectedness in the spirit of a “soft watch”, and a friendship which will endure.