EG 2009 Dinner

Here's another shot of the Rathaus in Marienplatz. I took this on the way to the conference dinner at the Hofbrauhaus. Yesterday I found out that they have these figurines up in the tower that dance around when the bells ring. I think only at 5pm, I'm not sure. The conference dinner was a good combination of buffet and sit-down dinner. A couple of years ago EuroGraphics didn't have a sit-down dinner, just the regular kind of walk around from station to station to pick up finger food, then keep wandering with a tiny plate in your hand. Maybe find a small round table to stand up against. Not as good as the sit-down dinner in Saarbrucken in 2002. There we were at round tables where they came around and served food. Then there was dancing. All in this in old steel plant or something. Here, we had long tables at which we sat and then we got up and queued up for the buffet. They loaded your plate up with a ton of food; some kind of pig roast or something they were carving up along with plenty of beer.

During the course of dinner I discovered I was sitting across from my cousin! Small world! He's studying computer graphics at Trinity College Dublin, where I know some people as well. Later I met this lady working at Cambridge who was at Leicester previously; we had a common friend. Pretty fun, but I got so stuffed with food that all I could do after dinner was waddle to the hotel and crash. Well, it did go till midnight, which was kind of late anyway, so it was just as well. I would meet up with my brother the next day so it's a good thing I got some sleep :)

Deutsches Museum

My colleague here at the conference observed that "the Germans are all about engineering" and so he added "you have to go see the Deutsches Museum". So I took the S-Bahn and went. The only other similar kind of museum that I've been to is the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C. This place is huge, and like the Smithsonian, seems to have a display on just about everything, although yes, the bent is clearly towards science and engineering.

Ok, so I was curious as to how "PC" this museum would be. Specifically, would they display any wartime things? Yup, the V-1 and V-2 were there as were several Messerschmitts (the Me 262, the first jet to be built in series and used in action, and the Bf 109, the standard fighter aircraft used by the Luftwaffe during WWII—these must have been the ones going up against the British Spitfires). I also happened to find nice model examples of a brigantine and the frigate, ships that were used in naval battles some 150 years earlier (although I don't recall whether the Germans had a fleet that figured as prominently as the fleets of Britain, France, Spain). The HMS Surprise was a frigate.

Schloss Nymphenburg

After the Alte Pinkothek, I hopped on the tram to get to the Schloss Nymphenburg. It reminded me of Willa Nova outside Warsaw, but a touch larger. Inside they only let you walk so far down the wings...I should have taken a shot of the main entry hall with its marble (?) tiles, but instead I just grabbed a few pics of various rooms.

Although the palace was more or less what you would expect of a palace, there was one interesting curiosity: King Ludwig's "Gallery of Beauties". This was one room filled wall-to-wall with portraits of beautiful women that Ludwig had commissioned. The writeup said something about Ludwig's selection from various social classes, from princesses to shoemaker's daughters, etc. I dunno, I think this Ludwig may have been a bit of a ladies' man. Maybe this room was his collection of "conquests"? :) Or maybe he was just a bit of a perv and this was his ahem, collection of unmentionable pictures (as they may have been at the time; today it would be walls full of Playboy pinups). Anyway, it was an interesting room.

Alte Pinakothek

Ah! My Canalettos! This one is Piazzetta und Riva Degli Schiavoni in Venedig, but I think Canaletto (and/or his students) may have painted this many times, possibly from several perspectives. Or maybe this is the painting of the Piazzetta and it happens to be in Munich. I wonder which is more likely, probably the former. I found it hanging at the Alte Pinakothek when I went on my museum tour on Tuesday (Wednesday I was mainly at the conference, working on a paper review, then gave my 1 min fast forward presentation, and today, Thursday, I gave my 15 min talk—incidentally, a couple of people came up and spoke with me about the work, and I made contact with a fellow who is doing something similar, so another eye tracking contact!).

Another Canaletto, this is Riva Degli Schiavoni vom Ausgang des Canal Grande aus Gesehen, which I'm guessing means River Degli Schiavoni (?) with exit of Grande Canal...but what's "aus Gesehen"? Anyway, it's one with the dog taking a dump, which I focused on here, but unfortunately this, like many of my photos, is quite blurry. Corey takes better art gallery pics than I do. Anyway, there were only a couple of Canalettos, there were many more Rubens (I think the one at right is a Rubens—I have other shots that I know are Rubens but they're not sharp). Lots of rather voluptuous people in various harrowing scenes. Lot of heaven and hell type of stuff. Really good though.

Besides the vedutisti I also like the work of the Dutch masters, particularly for their realistic depictions, like Van Dyck's portrait of Georg Petel here. The eyes are really well done. And I'm also starting to really like Brouwer as he seemed to have particularly enjoyed depicting "common" scenes like this fiddler in some kind of tavern. There were several others depicting various bars, drunkards, and even fights (there was one of a card cheater being discovered in an "action scene" with the card table in the middle of falling over, etc.). I think I've discovered a good strategy for art galleries: skip right past all the Madonna and Child pics and head straight for the good stuff!

Marienplatz

This is Marienplatz, a square fairly squarely in the center of town. It's usually pretty busy and appears to be a central meeting place for people otherwise scattered about Munich. My hotel is just four or so blocks down Kaufingerstr. and then down a couple of smaller adjoining streets. Kaufingerstrasse is a wide mostly pedestrian street cutting through Marienplatz but early in the mornings its occupied by trucks bringing in goods to the stores on the street.

On the other side of Marienplatz stands this ornate building, the Rathaus maybe? I'm not really sure what it is, but I think maybe it houses City Hall. The status is of St. Peter, I believe. Kaufingerstr. is lined by fairly upscale stores, some of which look really expensive. One curiosity is that some of the stores sell what look like to be traditional Bavarian garments, lederhosen and the like. It's difficult to tell whether this is meant to be some kind of costume or whether it's everyday wear.

Typical outfits of what people wear vary, but have that European look: this time of year a lot of the women wear knee-high boots (over jeans), the men have pointy shoes. There's a few "Goth" representatives and these guys—I particularly like the guy at right who is "AGAINST ***ALL*** AUTHORITY". Meanwhile, just off one of the corners of the square is this little market, the Viktualienmarkt, offering various victuals, as the name suggests. It's really quite convenient when you're just looking for a snack, you can find really tasty sandwiches here. I was looking for a quick bite one afternoon, but didn't want dinner yet. This was ideal, just grabbed a sandwich and that hit the spot. I'm glad I picked a hotel close to Marienplatz because of its central location. There's a subway station here that connects everywhere: the conference center (a 1/2 hr ride) as well as the airport (about an hour if I remember correctly). A colleague of mine staying at an official conference hotel says there's nothing there, so he's got to ride the subway in both directions: conference and city center. Not a big deal I guess, but it's nice to have something of interest nearby I think.