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When the term Museum approaches the city of Paris, the mind immediately leads us to the Louvre. A true statement, but only partially, because the Ville Lumiére is made up of three great museums that make up the most extraordinary collection of western art, from prehistory to contemporary art.
BEST PARIS MUSEUMS
LOUVRE MUSEUM
The largest building as well as one of the main museums in the world. The exterior is sumptuous, wonderful, with the famous glass pyramid, high 21 meters, in the center. West of the Pyramid is the Arc de Triomphe du Carousel, the work of Visconti and Lefuel; to the west and south, three pavilions face each other. The Louvre is visited every year by over 5 million people: a truly impressive figure.
The collections of the Museum are divided into three sections: Sully, Denon e Richelieu. Accurate visit to all departments is literally impossible, because it would take several days. Simply follow your tastes, informing the collections in advance. The official website of the Louvre is, in this sense, a monstrous source of information. Visit the portal because every work exhibited in the museum is carefully cataloged, explained, and localized to be easily found during a future visit. To describe them roughly, here, is absolutely useless and reductive, because each deserves the right space and depth.
Among the most admired pieces there is, of course, the “Gioconda” or “Monna Lisa” by Leonardo Da Vinci, dated 1503-1506. Today, even more observed, due to Dan Brown’s bestseller “The Da Vinci Code”, from which Ron Howard made a very successful film. I dwell on the most celebrated work of Leonardo, also because, say a bit ‘of everything, on such a large museum, it is like saying nothing.
The Louvre museum boasts, of course, numerous sections of immense value, including that of archeology; very important pieces are here preserved. We move from the art of the Near East, to the Egyptian, Greek, Etruscan and Roman art, up to Islamic art. Among the works of archeology exhibited at the Louvre, the Hellenistic “Nike” of Samothrace, at the moment when it stands out its magical flight from the bow of a ship; the Greek “Cavaliere Rampin”, about 550 aC; for the section of Ancient Egypt, they deserve them Annals of Tutmosis III, from Karnak, Luxor, dating back to the 1479-1425 BC. Worth noting is the interesting Official App of the museum, available on the Play Store, and App store, with which you can also build a personalized visit tailored to your tastes and interests.
INFO AND PRICES
The Museum is open every day, from Friday to Monday, from 09:00 to 18:00; Wednesdays and Thursdays, from 09:00 to 21:45! Closed on Tuesdays, 01/01, 01/05 and 25/12.
The cost of the full ticket is €17.00 per person. Children under the age of 24 enter for free (booking required on the hotel website). It is absolutely recommended to buy tickets online: you will avoid unnecessary queues at the ticket offices. The Louvre is part of the PARIS MUSEUM PASS circuit
Audio guides in Italian available at the entrance to the Museum at an additional cost of €5. Free admission for all on July 14 (Bastille Day).
HOW TO GET TO LOUVRE
In Metro you arrive at the stop Palais-Royal-Musée du Louvre station (1 line).
Bus: the following bus stops in front of the Pyramid: 21, 24, 27, 39, 48, 68, 69, 72, 81, 95, or Paris Open Tour bus.
For those interested, there is also a stop with Batobus, in Quai François Mitterrand.
ORSAY MUSEUM
The Musée d’Orsay, with the Louvre, is one of the landmarks for art lovers, as well as among the most important museums in Paris and throughout Europe. Given the difficulty in visiting them both, in case you have planned a trip of a few days in the Capital, simply choose according to your tastes.
However, do not be fooled by the Louvre’s fame: the Musée d’Orsay it’s just as beautiful and important. In our opinion, it deserves to be visited as much, if not more, than the Louvre itself. The museum has been set up, starting from the 1977, inside an old railway station that has been out of use for years, and even thought about demolishing it. The transformation of the station into a museum and the restoration of the building was entrusted to Renaud Bardon, Pierre Colboc and Jean-Paul Philippon.
Inside are kept the works produced between the 1848 and 1914, belonging to different artistic currents, including Impressionism, whose masterpieces have made the museum famous. On the fifth floor, in fact, you can admire the works of great painters like Monet, Cezanne, Renoir o Degas. All the works grouped at the Orsay competitions come from three museums (Louvre, Jeu de Paume, d’Art Moderne) and some private collections, as well as a series of acquisitions.
The continuous enrichment of the collections is a symptom of the incessant activity of a museum that is always in constant transformation! On the official website of the Musée, it is possible to obtain practical information and, above all, all the collections present in the structure.
Visiting what is in effect one of the best museums in Paris is an experience not to be missed during your vacation.
INFO AND PRICES
Open every day from 09:30 to 18:00. On Thursday the closing is postponed to 21:45. Closed on Mondays. Prices: full 16€; reduced €13 for admissions on Thursdays after 18:00 and for children between 18 and 25 years old; free under 18.
HOW TO GET TO THE ORSAY MUSEUM
At the museum you arrive with METRO or RER, getting off at the stop Solférino o Assemblée Nationale, o Musée d’Orsay (RER C). Alternatively, you can use one of the buses: 24, 63, 68, 69, 73, 83, 84, 94.
NATIONAL CENTER OF ART AND DE CULTURE GEORGES-POMPIDOU
Opened in the 1977, this structure was initially intended to welcome 5000 visitors a day, even become 25000, so as to make it the real cultural space par excellence. His identity took even more body after the last renewal. The building is named after the president George Pompidou which, at the end of the sixties, wanted to give the French capital a place where the public could access contemporary art, within a space that could be shared with the cinema, the visual arts, music and photography.
The building that houses the Pompidou Center, was built in the years ’70 on a project of the Italian Renzo Piano and the English Richard Rogers. It is a decidedly ‘original’ work in which the various parts of the structure have a chromatic correspondence, identifying themselves in different circuits. The colors used are red, blue, yellow and green, each of which distinguishes a different content of the sheaths; the blue for the air, the green for the liquids, the yellow for the electric cables and the red for the communication ways.
The interior includes five floors and two basements; to point out that, some activities present, in the philosophy of the whole project, move from one room to another. Also not to be missed is the Bibliothèque Publique d’information and, above all, the National Museum of Modern Art in which over 30000 900 works of art of French and foreigners are kept. Further information can be found on the official portal of the Center.
INFO AND PRICES
The center is open every day from 11 to 22. Closed on Tuesday.
The price of the full-fare ticket is 14, and allows access to all the spaces of the structure (reduced 11€) on the same day.
The ticket “Vue de Paris”, which allows you to access only the 6 Level of the building for a city view, costs 3€ (included in the whole ticket from 14€).
The Center, every first Sunday of the month is FREE FOR EVERYONE.
HOW TO GET TO POMPIDOU MUSEUM
To arrive, the METRO or RER stops are Rambuteau, Hôtel de Ville, Châtelet-Les Halles(RER). Alternatively you can use the Buses: 21, 29, 38, 47, 58, 69, 70, 72, 74, 75, 76, 81, 85, 96
The Paris Museums are part of the circuit PARIS PASS