The Louvre Revisited

Updated March 2025 – This post gets updated whenever we visit the Louvre.

Marie, reminiscing:

(2011) Some years ago we visited the Louvre (2007 to be exact) — and I still remember the feeling like it was yesterday. I was absolutely delighted, maybe even a little overwhelmed. For someone like me, who had always nurtured a quiet dream of becoming a painter, it truly felt like a dream come true. As a child, I would spend hours flipping through encyclopedias and art books, completely fascinated by the works of great masters like Monet and Van Gogh. Their colors, their brushstrokes, even their tragic stories — they all left a mark on me, even if I could only admire them on printed pages back then.

Later on, my tastes grew broader. I found myself drawn to the sharp edges and bold experiments of Picasso, the intricate precision of Dürer, the lightness of Monet, and the golden, almost otherworldly beauty of Klimt. So when I finally found myself face to face with some of famous painters’ actual works, not reproductions or photographs but the real thing — it was almost surreal. To stand so close that you could see the texture of the paint, the cracks of time, the human touch behind each piece — there’s something deeply humbling about that.

And yet, even with everything we saw, it felt like just the tip of an iceberg. The Louvre is vast — a maze of stories and centuries — and I know I’ve only scratched the surface. There’s still so much more to explore, and that excites me.

I’ve often written about my love for the arts on my other blogs — especially in the earlier days, when I used to interview artists and try to interpret their work, often comparing their explanations with my own impressions. That dialogue — that exchange of perspectives — is something I truly miss. It’s been a long time since I’ve done that, and of course, visiting the Louvre, as beautiful as it was, didn’t offer that opportunity. But in a way, it gave me something else: silence, stillness, and the colors of centuries speaking without words.

For those few hours, we let ourselves be immersed in that world — wandering slowly, taking it all in. It was peaceful, inspiring, and deeply nourishing to the soul. I’d go back in a heartbeat.

Harold, revisited:

(Fast forward to 2016) — nearly a decade after Marie and I first set foot in the Louvre together — I found myself there once more, though this time under different circumstances. Not with her, but with a visiting friend. It was a bit of a strange feeling, walking those familiar halls again, but in a different chapter of life, without – the wife.

The place hadn’t changed much — still grand, still awe-inspiring, still filled with quiet corners and stunning masterpieces that seemed to speak through time. But for me, the experience carried a new kind of weight. There was nostalgia, yes, but also a sense of distance. I remembered how Marie had lit up the first time we came — how she lingered a little longer in front of the Impressionists, how she tried to sketch a few quick lines in her notebook when she thought no one was looking.

This visit was more about looking at each display again, trying to see it all through fresh eyes. And yet, every so often, I’d pause in front of a familiar piece — a Dürer portrait, a Picasso sketch — and feel like I was briefly transported back to that first time. The past has a funny way of sneaking up on you in places like the Louvre, where centuries blur together and time bends around art.

It wasn’t quite the same, but it was meaningful in its own quiet way. A reminder, maybe, that while the people beside us may change, and the moments may never repeat exactly, the beauty of art — and the memories it holds — is always waiting for us to return.

Coming Back Together

October 2023 brought with it something we never quite anticipated — a rather big and beautiful surprise. Harold’s artwork was selected to be displayed at the Carrousel du Louvre, as part of the Salon International d’Art Contemporain. Yes, that Louvre. It still feels a little unreal to say it out loud.

The past years, we had visited the museum as admirers, eyes wide with awe and reverence for the greats — and now here we were again, but this time not just as spectators, but participants. Harold’s work, hanging in a gallery space just beneath the Louvre’s grand halls, became a part of a wider conversation in contemporary art. It was an incredible honor, and truly, a full-circle moment.

We spent several days in Paris, soaking in the experience, letting it settle in. There was a quiet joy in walking past the glass pyramid once more, this time with a different kind of purpose. We watched as visitors from all over the world passed by Harold’s piece — pausing, leaning in, reading, thinking. It was humbling and exhilarating all at once.

There was no red carpet, no grand speeches — but there was delight. We stood together in that space, taking it all in: the lights, the buzz, the language of art flowing from wall to wall. And deep down, I think we both felt that unspoken recognition — that after years of loving, studying, and living alongside art, we had somehow found our way into its living, breathing world.

It’s a memory we’ll always carry — those days at the Louvre, not just as dreamers, but as part of the dream.

Returning to Paris and a Special Photo

February 2024 brought us back to Paris once again, and with it, another milestone in our creative journey — Harold’s participation in Art Capital at the Grand Palais. Just being part of that historic exhibition, where generations of artists have showcased their work, felt like standing in the stream of something much larger than ourselves. But what made this trip even more meaningful was that this time… we were three.

Our daughter went with us.

There was something incredibly special about sharing this city with her — a place so deeply woven into our memories, a place that had watched parts of our story unfold, quietly, beautifully, over the years. And now, to return not just as a couple, but with our eldest — it added an entirely new layer of depth to the experience.

Of course, we made time to visit the Louvre again. We walked through the familiar spaces, tracing old steps, pointing out paintings, sharing stories, watching her eyes light up the way ours once did.  She looked up at the same masterpieces we once stood in awe of — and suddenly, everything felt new again, seen through her gaze.

Then came the photo.

There’s this one spot — unremarkable to most — but to us, it holds so much. It’s where I took a photo of Harold and our two older kids, during our earliest visits. Back then, we were full of wide-eyed wonder, still just dreamers peering in from the outside. We found the same spot. A photo decades in the making. A quiet, powerful symbol of time passing, dreams evolving, and life unfolding in ways we never could’ve planned. (In an ideal world, there would have been three—if not four—of them in the second photo. But life plays the unfair card sometimes, and it hurts knowing it may take a little longer before I can capture them all together again. Still, I’ll wait.)

To see her there — to be there — was a moment we’ll never forget.

This return to Paris wasn’t just about the art we brought or the exhibit we joined. It was about legacy, about connection, about witnessing the passing of inspiration from one generation to the next. The Louvre welcomed us back, and in a way, so did the dreams we once left there. But now we weren’t just revisiting them — we were living them, together.