Rodin, or I didn't just spend my time in San Francisco doing Maltese Falcon stuff...

I'm sure the last two posts have you worried that I spent much of my San Francisco time looking up places based on the actions of various fictional characters, but rest assured. I did make time to get out and some of the other things San Francisco has to offer (as well as work on some of my law school stuff for class next week).

Coming into San Francisco, I didn't really have too many plans about things I wanted to see. I wanted to visit the Hammett sights, but other than that, I just wanted to see what was around. So, Thursday afternoon, when I was planning Friday afternoon, I just googled, "San Francisco sights" and tried to get some ideas. And I was lucky to find there is a pretty substantial collection of sculptures by Rodin here. So, this afternoon, while Dinah was hard at work, I went to the Legion of Honor Museum to see a mess of sculptures by the master.

The grounds of the museum are surrounded by a golf course and a park, which means they are gorgeous and well kept. Also, they are strikingly quiet and expansive--especially in San Francisco, where space is at a premium and everything is built as close together as possible. It was a nice change of pace.

I have only included pictures of Rodin's two of the scuptures here. The Thinker is, of course, a very famous sculpture and the museum has it sitting in the front court yard with nothing else around it. It's very striking.

The other sculpture I thought would be nice to include was a piece called The Great Hand, and, while I am no art critic, I think it captures what I really like about Rodin--the passion and tension he captures in his sculpture.

The museum also has on its grounds a Holocaust Memorial, pictured below. It's a really striking sculpture and I think the picture pretty much says it all.