Le Pont Des Arts

If there is a bridge to see in Paris, that's definitely the Pont Des Arts (Bridge of Arts).

The Pont des Arts or Passerelle des Arts is a pedestrian bridge in Paris which crosses the Seine River. It links the Institut de France and the central square (cour carrée) of the palais du Louvre, (which had been termed the "Palais des Arts" under the First French Empire).



Pont Des Arts with the Palais du Louvre in the background.



A typical summer afternoon in the Ponts Des Arts. Lot of people, music bands, lovers, tourists, people enjoying the weather, drinking wine, chatting... It's usually a nice place to chill out. Actually, my favorite place for lunch in Paris !!



Pont Des Arts by night. The Institute of France is in the background.

Art historian Kenneth Clark is credited with writing about the Ponts des Arts in his book Civilisation:

"I am standing on the Pont des Arts in Paris. On the one side of the Seine is the harmonious, reasonable facade of the Institute of France, built as a college in about 1670. On the other bank is the Louvre, built continuously from the Middle Ages to the nineteenth century: classical architecture at its most splendid and assured. Just visible upstream is the Cathedral of Notre Dame --not perhaps the most lovable of cathedrals, but the most rigorously intellectual façade in the whole of Gothic art. [...]

What is civilisation? I do not know. I can't define it in abstract terms --yet. But I think I can recognise it when I see it: and I am looking at it now."

Kenneth Clark, Civilisation (1969).



Credit Photos: Olivier G (Flickr), Wordpress, Wikipedia, me