Show us your favorite work of art (fiction, music, sculpture, painting, architecture, dance, etc).
Submitted by Dean.
I’ve been meaning to answer this VoxHunt for a couple of days, because I thought it was a pretty good question.
Music: I thought about this one long and hard, but I think my very favorite piece of music is the Second Movement from Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony. There is a sense of somber grandeur to this piece – I get chills whenever I listen to it. I can play a simplified version of the theme on the piano and I play it whenever I want to just get lost in it for a few moments.
Painting: When I went to Paris in 1994, among the hundreds (if not thousands) of paintings that I saw, there was one that absolutely took my breath away when I saw it. It was in the Musée de l’Orangerie (and it wasn’t Monet’s “Water Lillies”) – it was a simple piece that caught my eye from across the gallery room – Renoir’s “Two Girls at a Piano”. The girls seemed so joyful, they nearly leapt from the canvas. No poster or reprint I’ve been able to find can capture that dynamic quality of the original. Breathtaking.
Sculpture: Also in Paris, was The Rodin Museum, which was a truly unexpected treat (I didn’t even know it was there when I went and I continually made Rodan pantomimes – philistine, I know — until I got there). Anyway, among the larger pieces like “The Thinker” and “The Gates of Hell” was a smaller, but exquisite piece showing two hands just about to be entwined – “The Cathedral”. I think its an incredibly sensual and romantic piece and captures that sense of anticipation right before two people connect.
Stevil 
I especially like "The Cathedral." I think I was absent the day they handed out the appreciation-for-truly-fine-art gene, because I've never really been into art or classical anything (literature, music, what have you) or anything like that, but I appreciate people who appreciate truly fine art. :)
to all three. That second movement is gorgeous. I've never seen or heard of "The Cathedral" before (admittedly, I've never been exposed to a lot of sculpture-y goodness), but that's beautiful–lucky you, getting to see it in person!As for "Two Girls at the Piano"–I had no idea that was a Renoir. My piano teacher has a poster/reprint/whatever one calls those up on her wall, so of course now I have the negative association of lesson-time-anxiety with that painting, hahaha.
Joie — the funny thing about Renoir is that he worked in molds and so often made several castings of his pieces. There are several "Thinkers", and I would bet that you don't have to go all the way to France to see "The Cathedral".
And I don't usually like Renior all that much — too often seems like chubby kids with rosy cheeks — but this one really struck me…