Paris: Art Museum Overload

It is easy to go into Paris art museum overload. Paris has long been a magnet for artists. King Louis XIV decided that France was to be the world leader in all things including fashion and art. His dream started with Versailles and the French have never looked back. The palace he abandoned to move his court to Versailles is now the biggest art museum in the world – the Louvre.

Later, in the 19th century, France led the world in a new artistic direction with the Impressionist movement which was the forerunner to today’s modern art.

If you want to immerse yourself in art, Paris is a great place to do it. There are numerous museums dedicated to art. Picasso and Rodin have dedicated galleries and there are other smaller venues as well. On this, our first trip to Paris, we focused on the big two – the Louvre and Musee D’Orsay ‘ and on a special exhibit I had learned about courtesy of a Facebook post by one of my art instructors.

Musee D’Orsay

The Paris art museum I was most interested in was Musee D’Orsay. This museum lies across the River Seine from the Louvre and is dedicated to art from 1848 through 1914. The building was an old railway station that was to be torn down in the 1970s. Instead the government made it a landmark and turned it into a museum to bridge the gap between the existing Louvre and the Pompidou Center of Modern Art.

We took the Batobus to the museum, arriving mid-afternoon on a Thursday to avoid the worst of the crowds and take advantage of its late night closure on Thursdays. This actually worked pretty well. We had ignored the recommendations of travel experts to get tickets ahead of time but our line moved quickly and we were through security in about thirty minutes.

Since I really wanted to focus on the Impressionists, we made a beeline to the elevator to the fifth floor and started with them. It was wonderful! Room after room of Monet, Manet, Renoir, Degas, Pissaro and more.

Up here you also get the Post Impressionists – Van Gogh, Seurat and the Pointillists being the stars.

The middle floors contain sculpture and decorative items so we did not spend much time there. We went back down to the first floor to go through the precursors to the Jmpressionists, the Realists. They were equally amazing.

To wrap up our evening at Musee D’Orsay, there was a concert by a French music group called Canine. The music was great, at times haunting, and the staging was interesting. The way their sound reverberated in the museum was really cool.

The Louvre

My husband insisted that as an artist it was my duty to visit the granddaddy of Paris art museums, the Louvre. I was happy with Musee D’Orsay, but had to agree with him so we went.

Here, too, we did not buy tickets in advance. So, like we did for Musee D’Orsay, we went mid-afternoon to take advantage of the Louvre’s late Friday hours. However, the security line is longer here so it took us nearly an hour to get into the pyramid. Then we wondered where everybody went because there was virtually no ticket line. But we found them again in the post ticket purchase security line. This was inside the pyramid with the sun streaming through the glass making it really hot. The security people were actually handing out umbrellas for you to keep out of the sun! This line ended at the top of an escalator near the entrance to the Richelieu Wing.

I need to talk about the audio guide. It was the bane of my existence for much of the time we were at the Louvre. First, it is a Gameboy like device with a full headset. I have never used a Gameboy so it took me forever to figure out how to really use the thing. And, if I had the headset on, I couldn’t hear anything else so couldn’t talk to Dave unless I took it off. The whole apparatus was big and bulky. There was an interactive map that was mildly helpful. By the time I figured out how to type in the numbers next to artwork with audio information, we were more than halfway through the museum.

The Louvre has three wings – Richelieu, Sully, and Denon. We should have gone into either of the other two but followed the crowd into Richelieu where it seemed everyone had one goal – to see the Mona Lisa. It was madness, up one escalator after another, at a snail’s pace, with no opportunity to get off the Mona Lisa train until the top floor … where we bailed. And jumped into the French renaissance painters.

We made it through one section and somehow found ourselves in the Sully Wing (more French painters). So, we followed that all the way around, back to the Richelieu wing that we wanted to finish exploring, only to be told that the Richelieu Wing would not be staying open until 9:00 like the rest of the museum. I’m not sure exactly what we missed out on but we moved on and down to the next level where we found ‘The Winged Victory of Samothrace’ and headed into the Denon Wing.

In the Denon Wing we found the Italian painters and more French painters (from the 1800s). Here we found the collection of DaVincis, Raphaels, and other Italian renaissance masters. We also found some of the most famous French paintings including ‘Liberty Leading the People’ and ‘The Coronation of Napolean’. Spanish, English and American painters are also on this level but that part of the museum also did not stay open late so we missed them. Moving further down, we found the part of the museum showcasing what the building was like as a palace including some of the crown jewels.

And that was about all we got to see. They start announcing that the museum is closing about thirty minutes before it does to start moving you to the exit. As we made our way in that direction we made quick work of the Greek and Roman statues and called it a day.

The Louvre is undergoing some renovation so we ran into a number of areas that were closed off. In fact, the Mona Lisa is in a temporary home while her normal spot is being redone. Directional signage was not always clear. All in all, the Louvre is very large and very confusing for the first time visitor. Next time we will have a better plan of attack.

Van Gogh Illumination

While I enjoyed two of the most famous art museums in the world, my favorite art experience in Paris was the Van Gogh Illumination Exhibit, in Paris through the end of the year. I learned about this event through a social media post by one of my art instructors and looked into it. When I discovered it would be in Paris while we were there I knew I had to go. All I can say is WOW!

They have taken Van Gogh’s paintings and brought them to life by projecting them on all the surfaces of a huge warehouse like room. The images are on the floor, the walls, on the inside and outside of cylindrical rooms. The whole experience is set to music ranging from classical and opera to bluesy rock. It is fabulous!

The next post will focus on our daytrip to Versailles. http://europeyourway.net/versailles