If memory can be trusted – and I wouldn’t, necessarily – the background of this montage was based on a photograph taken two years ago at the Louvre. Something about that luscious chair appealed. The focus, however, was supposed to be the crow – a bird species I hold special feelings for. When my children were young I convinced them (probably one of the last times I convinced them of anything) that I could communicate with crows, and you could see me flapping about the backyard, wildly cawing, to the consternation of the bird population and probably the amusement of the rest of the neighborhood.

Crows are not just quite intelligent birds, they are culturally adaptive, superb tool makers and sport an incredible multitude of voices and expressions. For a short introduction there is the TED talk below, for longer perusal there is an interesting book, In the Company of Crows and Ravens, by John M. Marzluff.

https://www.ted.com/talks/joshua_klein_on_the_intelligence_of_crows?language=en

If you are lucky enough to travel to Paris in the next months and if the Louvre is on your list of things to see, you will be surprised. The I.M. Pei pyramid in the courtyard, so controversial at its inception and so beloved now, is playing hide and seek. Muralist JR, commissioned by the museum, is casting a trompe l’oeil spell over the structure. The article below explains in more detail (and is surprisingly catty when discussing work of another graffiti artist, Banksy.) https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2016/may/26/louvre-pyramid-trompe-l-oeil-jr-im-pei-paris-museum  I, by the way, when first visiting, was startled by all these people in front of the pyramid holding up their arms until I inquired: if you photograph them from a specific angle, it looks as if they are touching the top of the pyramid.  Another bit of useless knowledge crowding my brain……