Meet me by the Pharaoh at 4 o'clock

Even though it's an obvious landmark near the main entrance to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, I didn't notice this piece at all during our trip to the museum last September.

But since we arranged to meet there at 4 o'clock, this time I paid more attention to it. And if it felt like I was seeing it for the first time, indeed I was.












As announced by the Met, this piece is a temporary 10-year loan from the Berlin State Museum.











It's a few degrees more powerful than the other Egyptian statuary in the Met.
Take a look at those knees --and at the three entwining forms within the forearm.

Then take a look at how it compares with the following piece, done 500 years later:








This piece doesn't look bad - until it's compared with its predecessor.

















Dynasty 18, reign of Akhenaten,  fragment face of a Queen, possibly Nefertiti or Kiya, 26.7.1396




Here's my favorite fragment of all time. Or -- at least I think it is -- because I remember it being colored pink.   I searched for it in vain last September - so I prioritized its discovery on this visit.

Does the museum have two - one yellow and one pink ?

It's so wonderful, I have to doubt it -- just as I doubt the piece would be improved if the rest of the face hadn't been lost.

These are those big, crazy, sensual lips that sculptors introduced to please Akhenaten -- and then disappeared at the end of his reign.






And then our wandering through the Met began -- focusing on the special exhibitions - but occasionally including whatever we saw when walking from one to another.

Incredibly enough, there were so many special exhibitions, we couldn't see all of them in two full days (and the gallery was open until 9 pm both Friday and Saturday)

Being a big fan of Cambodian sculpture, my first stop was "Lost Kingdoms: Hindu-Buddhist Sculpture of Early Southeast Asia, 5th to 8th Century"










There's nothing more exciting, for me, than the figure sculpture of a "Lost Kingdom" -- with a style that was well developed  in a royal workshop,  but scarcely found in the museums  that I visit.

But as it turnsedout -- nothing in this show excited me enough to snap a picture of it.

(these images are taken from the Met's website -- which happily offers multiple views of every single piece in the show.  Thank you Met !!! )










These pieces are pleasant -- but just not as compelling as some things I've seen from the 12th Century (the Angkor Wat era )








Our next stop was "Goya and the Altamira Family", in which the above well-known painting was the only one worth seeing.

But it was good to see it again -- especially beside this less adept child's portrait by one of Goya's collaborators.



















Recently, thanks to a large donation,  Chicago's Art Institute has been showing a lot more Japanese painting.

Now at the Met, "The Flowering of Edo Period Painting" is a similar display from the  Feinberg Collection











Ike no Taiga is an interesting character:  a peasant's son who became a scholar/artist in Kyoto.

On the internet, he's best known for his Shunga that was possibly produced for commercial reasons in his fan-painting shop.



























Here's a curious contemporary piece found amid the Japanese screens - it's a stuffed deer covered with plastic bubbles.
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We took a little break now, beside the Noguchi fountain - to enjoy the sound of dripping water.