The Musée d’Orsay is renowned for being one of the most beautiful museums in the world and having one of the richest collections. Situated on the left bank of the Seine opposite the Tuileries Gardens, it has not always been a museum. Built by Victor Laloux for the 1900 Universal Exhibition, the building was initially a railway station before being transformed into a museum in 1986.
© Fotolia
The permanent collections of this multidisciplinary museum are devoted to the art of the Western world – painting, sculpture, decorative arts, graphic arts, architecture, and photography – from 1848 to 1914; that is a total of 6,000 works of which only 3,000 are on show to the public at any one time.
Major works include: Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe by Edouard Manet, La classe de danse by Edgar Degas, Des glaneuses by Jean-François Millet, the Bal du moulin de la Galette by Auguste Renoir, the series of Cathédrales de Rouen by Claude Monet, the Cirque by Georges Seurat, Les joueurs de carte by Paul Cézanne, Les femmes de Tahiti by Paul Gauguin, Portrait de l'artiste by Vincent van Gogh ... The Museum has one of the largest collections of Impressionist and Post-Impressionist works in the world.
In addition to the permanent collections, numerous events are held throughout the year: temporary exhibitions, concerts, lectures, seminars, shows ...
Useful information
From 9.30am to 6pm. From 9.30am to 9.45pm Thursday. Closed to Monday.
Esplanade Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, Paris 7th
