The Birth of the Musée du Louvre

On August 10, 1793, the Musée Central des Arts de la République was opened. You may know it as the Musée du Louvre. 

Art was not a stranger to the Palais du Louvre and going back to the 16th century, François I first held a few of his prized pieces. Under Louis XIV, they added the Salle des Rois, today's Galerie d’Apollon, and in 1725 moved the yearly Salon to the Salon Carré along with the Academy of Paintings. 

At its opening, the museum held 538 paintings, 48 sculptures from the Salle des Antiquities, 39 antique and modern busts, and 29  hard stone tables with 36 hard stone vases, 37 porcelain as well as many bronze clocks, objets d’art, and two large Sèvres vases filling the Grande Galerie, and no Mona Lisa in sight. 

Listen to the entire saga in this week's newest episode. 

For more info, check ClaudineHemingway.com 

Transcript

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Bonjour, bonjour, and welcome to another episode of Paris in Blue, Blonde, Rouge with Claudine Hemingway. That's me. And if you're listening to this the day it comes out, I'm bringing it to you a day early because today is a very, very important day in French history, and history of the world, really. It is August 10th, and on August 10th, 1793, a very important place opened its doors for the very first time to the public. And that is, of course, what we know today as the Musée du Louvre, my favorite place in the world. So it's always a big day. I always think about this day. I have in the past been into the Louvre on this day, and I've even gotten to the little cafe that's up in the Denon wing and got the little chocolate dessert that looks like a pyramid, and sat outside and I brought a candle and took a picture one year, but I didn't light the candle because I thought they'd probably frown upon that, even though I was outside and I celebrated her birthday. So it was 233 years ago today. And not only is it August 10th, the birthday of the Louvre, but it's also the marking of pretty much the day that the monarchy fell in French history. And that is exactly why they picked August 10th to open the Louvre. But I'm going to tell you the whole story. And I'm bringing this to you a whole day early because I wanted to do it on the actual birthday. And because I just, if you've listened to me now for 30 some odd episodes, or you listen to me before you read anything that I write every single day on social media or my website or YouTube videos or the list goes on, you know I love an anniversary and I love historic date. So I wanted to do this specifically. So I'm hoping if you are listening to this to this today, you should have like a you know chocolatey dessert or something to celebrate and hoist it up in the air and say, Happy birthday, Louvre. It's a big day. But I went by this morning. I didn't go in. I had clients that I was giving a tour around the Twilleries, but I did talk about the birthday, of course, because we were outside the Louvre. And I walked by and made a little video on the outside, kind of showing you exactly where it is. So I'll get that posted on my Instagram as well. So check that out. But I walked by and I was just thinking, are all those people in line at the Louvre? Do they even know how important this day is? Do they even care? I would stand there probably at the door and let them all know. I should next year, well, next year it's on a Tuesday and they'll be close. So in two years, I'm gonna maybe I should just order like, you know, 30,000 party hats, because that's how many people visit the Louvre on a day, and just stand it there at the pyramid and hand them out to everybody, and everybody should wear one. I I'm not gonna do that, but it's a fun thought. But let me get into telling you the story of how the Louvre came to be. So most people walking into the stunningly beautiful and reopened gallery d'Apalon are looking at the golden ceiling and may miss one of the most important markings on the entire Palais de Louvre. Just above the iron gates that were once a part of the Chateau des Massons, it's an inscription noting the decree of September 16, 1792, and the opening of the museum on August 10th, 1793. It was a warm summer day in the midst of the French Revolution. The Grand Gallery was open to visitors, a chance to view what was once hung on the walls of the great chateaus of the king. The Muse Central des Arts de la Republique was opened to the public. You know it today as the Musee de Louvre. It was August 10th, 1793, the one year anniversary of a very symbolic day marking the end of the French monarchy. At its opening, the museum held 538 paintings, 48 sculptures from the Saad des Antiques, 39 antique and modern busts, and 29 hard stone tables with 36 hard stone vases, 37 porcelain vases, as well as many bronze clocks, objects d'art, and two large serve vases that filled the Grand Gallery, and no Mona Lisa in sight. Although it was opened as a gift to the citizens of France, they were only allowed to visit a few days a week. These were the revolutionary years and the 10-day calendar was in place. The first five days of the week were for the artists and copyists, followed by two days of cleaning. The last three days of the week were for the public. Opening hours depended on the daylight. During the winter, the museum would have much shorter hours as they hadn't installed lighting yet. On that first day, the large doors of the Rotunde Mars opened. While the people were fighting against the monarchy and blood was being shed in the streets, visitors inside could view paintings by Da Vinci, Raphael, Verenese, and Titian. But where did all that art come from, you might wonder? A few weeks ago I shared the story of the looting of art done under Napoleon and the Directory in episode 28, but the opening collection dates to a much earlier time. It all begins with Francois Primier, who changed everything about the monarchy, rising to the throne on January 1st, 1515 at 21 years old, followed by the death of his cousin Louis XII. He was raised by his mother, Louis de Savoie, with an appreciation of art, architecture, music, poetry, and all things Renaissance. During his rule, he began the transformation of the Palais de Louvre into what we know it as today. It was on August 2nd, 1546, 480 years ago, that architect Pierre Lascaux was given the task of building a palace fit to reflect the French Renaissance and outshine anything the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V had. Francois Prime died the next year, but his son Henri II would continue his vision as did each king that followed. Francois didn't just want a palace, he also wanted a place to showcase his art. With a fondness for Italian art, Francois began to amass many of the paintings of the Italian masters and the masters himself, the most famous being Leonardo da Vinci, whom he was able to convince to pack up his paintings and move to France. For more, listen to episode 23. Other artists, including Rosso Florentino and Francesco Primoccio, also moved to France and moved to work at the Chateau de Fontableau. Francois Primier is credited not only with the creation of the royal collection of art, but also with creating the crown jewels. However, there are a few pieces today already attached to the throne when he arrived in 1515. Louis XII had obtained Fra Bartolomeo's Christ in the Garden with Mary Magdalene in 1506 from Pierre Parini, a Dominican monk, and passed it to his cousin Francois Primier, who succeeded after him. Another well-known painting, often called Le Bre Faronniere by the one and only Da Vinci, also most likely arrived in the hands of Louis XII a few years before the master himself moved to France. The title of the painting was given by Angres a few hundred years after it was painted, when he thought the painting was that of one of the mistresses of Francois Primier. These names stick even if they aren't correct. Francois gathered many more paintings that sadly didn't survive. Chateaus were drafty and damp and not the best climate for paintings, predominantly painted on wood. Francois hung many of his paintings in one of his favorite rooms, including the Mona Lisa, his apartment des Bain. And if you know a little French, then you know that's a bathroom. This wasn't the bathroom we think of today. It was a very large room with basins, but also without running water, fans, or drains. Pretty much the last place you want to hang a portrait painted on poplar. Many of the exquisite paintings he once had sadly never survived. We don't even have a complete inventory, but from what did survive, those years of steam and humidity, it must have been pretty great. His surviving collection included a few more Da Vinci's, The Virgin and Saint Anne, Madonna on the Rocks, and Bacchus, which is now associated with Da Vinci's Atelier more so than the Master, Andre del Sarto's charity, De La Visitation by Sebastian de Pomio, and Fra Bartolomeo's Incarnation of Christ. He once had a painting of Saint Sebastian by Bartolomeo that was one of the many lost. Then we have Raphael. The great Italian artist most likely met Francois Premier in Bologna. The king was also gifted a few paintings by Raphael from Pope Leo X. Within the Grand Gallery displayed near each other, the Raphaels of the King include a favorite Saint Michael slaying the demon, Le Grand Saint Famille de Francois Primier, La Belle Jardinere, Portrait of Jean d'Argonne, and portraits of two artists, including Raphael and his unknown friend, and then Saint Marguerite in honor of the king's sister. After the death of Francois Premier, his son Henri II acquired a few pieces, but didn't have the fervent passion for art that his father had. His three young sons who followed barely ruled or lived long enough to collect and were more focused on war than anything else. Henry IV didn't add as much to the collection of paintings, but he would contribute with the Gallery de Bordeleau built to link the Palais de Louvre to Catherine de Medici's Palais de Tuileries. Begun in 1595, the 1500-foot-long corridor was used by the young Louis XIII for fox hunts. Maybe they should bring back a fox or two in the high season. After the death of Henri Cat, hot legs Henry, if you know, in 1610, Marie de Medici made up for lost time. She commissioned large projects, including Reuben's cycle intended for her Palais de Luxembourg. Her son Louis XIII added a few pieces, but it was really a pair of cardinals that ramped up the collecting into overdrive. Cardinal Richelieu and Mazarin each became great advisors to Louis XIII and later Louis XIV. They commissioned and purchased so much art that they each had to build palaces just to hold it. Richelieu with the Palais Royale across the street from the Louvre and Mazarin with what is now the Bibliothè National de France on the Rue de Richelieu. After each of these deaths, their collections became property of the King of France. Their collections were so vast that entire rooms of the Louvre today are filled with sculptures Richelieu once owned, and the Gallery d'Apalon once held the massive collection of glass and hardstone vessels Mazarin acquired. Mazarin alone had more than 600 paintings that fed into the royal collection. One of my favorite paintings that once belonged to Cardinal Mazarin's is Raphael's Baldessar de Castiglione. In 1528, Castiglione published his Le Livre de Courtesan, filled with the stories of court life in Italy. It's a 16th century Down Abbey. Today he hangs in the Tribune of the Grand Gallery, once home to the Mona Lisa, a painting he also has a tie to. I'll share some more about that next week. Recently, Baldassar spent a few weeks in New York at the Met exhibit dedicated to Raphael, but I was very happy to see him home in the Louvre last week. While Louis XIV loved music, dance, and architecture, when it came to art, he let others tell him what he should collect. German-born collector Everhard Jabat held a large number of paintings and drawings of Italian and Northern artists and sold hundreds of pieces to Louis XIV in 1661 and 1671. He also advised him on art that was for sale in England and other cities he should acquire. In the 72-year reign of Louis XIV, only a fraction of less than five years were focused on art, but one might never know that when entire books are filled with the listings of paintings, sculptures, Alpha d'Ar, and drawings he acquired. Jabah's name is all over the Plaque and the Louvre, and for years I wondered just who he was. Many of the most famous pieces Louis XIV gathered came from Job, including Saint Jean de Baptiste by Da Vinci, Caravaggio's Death of the Virgin, The Country Concert by Giorgianet that inspired Manet to paint Designer Surlerbe, Verinese's Holy Family with Mary Magdalene in Renaissance clothing, Bernardino Luini's Salome receiving the head of John the Baptist, one that always catches people's eye, The Man with a Glove by Titian, and plenty of paintings from the Northern School, including Ans Auben Lejeune's recently restored portrait of Anne de Cleves. Louis XV added a few pieces to the royal gallery, including Raphael's Virgin with a Veil or Virgin in the Blue Tiara as she's more commonly known. However, his focus was more on parties and ladies and art. It was his favorite mistress, Madame de Pompadour, who was a great friend and champion of the artist and began the subtle whispers to create a museum to hold a portion of the crown's collection. Louis XV's grandson, Louis XVI, did have an interest in art. He was a very inquisitive young man who loved to read and create maps. He had an appreciation for art. Seeing a large void within the collection of French art, he instructed his many advisors, including the Comte Don Giviler, to acquire more French artists. There were two paintings in the royal collection that became the favorites of Louis XIII, the 14th, 15th, and 16th, and even traveled to Paris after the royal family was forcibly taken from Versailles. Verinese's pilgrim of Emilus, painted in 1559, depicts a scene after the resurrection of Christ sharing a meal with a few of his disciples and the wealthy family that commissioned the painting. Today it hangs on the eastern wall in view of the Mona Lisa. The other painting is Charles LeBron's Tent of Darius, which was painted in 1661 at the Chateau de Fontainebleau. This painting depicts Darius's mother throwing herself at the feet of the King of Macedonia. Louis XIV loved a painting and sculpture of a great leader and warrior. Both paintings were first hung in the king's bedroom at Versailles, and Louis XVI personally had them included in the handful of paintings he wanted at the Palais de Tuileries in 1791. They would also be the first two added to the collection of the Des de Louvre open. The LeBron painting is sadly not on display and was hung in the lysee Palace until the start of World War II. The very first museum opened to the public opened on October 14, 1750, within the Palais de Luxembourg. It was located in the east and west wings and included Rubens' cycle of 24 large paintings of the life of Marie de Medici. It was made up of the leftovers of the royal collection that were hanging at Versailles, included fewer than 100 paintings and a handful of drawings. Twice a week on Wednesdays and Saturdays, the public could visit for three whole hours. At the time of the opening of the Luxembourg, the royal collection expanded into over 1,800 pieces, a bulk added under Louis XIV. Many were so tightly linked to Versailles it was out of the question to move them. And imagine the king sleeping out alongside with Raphael Vernese and Charles LeBron. Meanwhile, back at the Louvre, when Louis XIV decided to flee to Versailles in 1678, he gave up the Palais de Louvre to the artists and the academics. Sculptors, painters, tapestry weavers, engraving workshops, and even a doctor and his son were on hand to give the artist lessons in anatomy. Filling the ground floor in the Grand Gallery of the Denon Wing as well as the Gallery d'Apalon and all the way to the colonnade on the eastern edge, even when it was without a roof. They helped pave the way for the idea of the once grand palace becoming a museum. The Musee de Luxembourg closed its doors in 1779 as the future Louis XVIII was moving in. A greater interest in creating a public museum was gaining traction, none more so than Charles-Claude Comte d'Angeviller, minister of the King's Buildings under Louis XVI. Beginning in 1775, he started to dream up a plan to fill the Long Gallery Bordeleau with the greatest art, including portraits of the kings and high-ranking ministers and officials. Anviller's idea of a museum lost ground when he was forced into exile on July 28, 1789. He returned a year later to only end up in exile again just before the king and queen were forced from Versailles. While France was turning away from the absolute monarchy and to the rights of the people, a group of Royal Academy artists suggested that art should be added to the three pillars of the new French society Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite. On August 9, 1792, the new government of Paris, the Paris Commune, moved into the offices of the Hotel de Ville. During the night they met to come up with a plan to save the state. Meeting until 3 a.m., one side wanted to attack the king and the other fought against it. Louis XVI wasn't playing along with the changes in the government and it was all about to end. At 8 a.m. on August 10, 1792, thousands of men, women, and even children armed with weapons charged the Palais de Tuileries. Louis XVI and his 950 Swiss guards moved inside the palace to guard the family and left 930 gendarmes and 2,000 National Guards outside to keep the angry mob at bay. One little issue, they had very little ammunition. The royal family was able to escape and ran through the Tuileries to the Assembly for safety. It was the end of the monarchy as the legislative assembly ended all rights of the king. On the same day, they voted to destroy all items and properties tied to the monarchy. The next day on August 11th, a commission was created to halt the process and search for and care for these items as national heritage. On September 16, 1792, three years into the French Revolution, the National Assembly of France declared a museum would be created to quote, bringing together monuments of all science and art. For the next year, things would move slowly, although art from the churches and emigrant families that left France had already begun to be amassed. In 1793, the Royal Academy of Paintings and Sculptures created the general commune of arts led by Jacques-Louis David and Jean Bernard Restaurant. The Royal Academy would be disbanded as it was tied to the monarchy, but the artists still united now to form a museum. Many believe the new museum also needed to be a place for the artists himself, one where they could copy the masters learning the varied techniques that would hopefully one day see their art in the National Museum. Artist Jean Francois Garnier even suggested a library be added to the museum for the artists to study art history as a fundamental portion of their education. All were in agreement that the museum should not have a political agenda of any kind, just a focus on art and the artists themselves. But I think we all know how that works out. Jean-Marie Roland served as a Minister of the Interior from the very day that the monarchy fell until just after the death of Louis XVI. He proposed a new idea for a museum that would be a smaller scale and should be known as the Musee Girodon for the political party he founded. Paintings of historical matters would be admitted and unapproved subjects. Roland appointed a group of artists, many of whom were already a part of the general commune of arts, as well as former members of the Don Villers Circle. To say the museum opened in turbulent times is an understatement. 1793 was quite a year. On January 21st, King Louis XVI was guillotined. The Girondins and the Montageons were fighting for power, ending with the rest of the Girondins on June 2nd. There was war in the Vendée, the death of Mara July 13th, and the imminent trial of Marie Antoinette. Roland was replaced with Dominique Joseph Gara as Minister of the Interior and announced that the museum would open on August 10, 1793, the same day as the 1793 salon and marked the one year anniversary of the fall of the monarchy. The original museum was much smaller and different from the stunning temple of art we have today. Much of the art was added and in place at the start of February 1793. While there were over 700 pieces in the Grand Gallery, only half of the space was used. The gallery itself was in bad shape and all plans to restore before opening were abandoned. Lighting was an issue, and at the time the ceiling was solid and without windows. Only the side windows were used and didn't adequately light the space, and also the southern windows led in damaging direct light. Between each window or bay, only 28 sections were used. On the north side from the door of the Salon Carré, 17 bays were used, and on the south side just nine. Partitions were added to shrink the space, the 300-year-old floors creaked and at times even gave way just enough for objects displayed on tables to fall off and break. The majority of the 538 paintings were split between the Northern School and Italian masters. 190 of the northern school included Van Dyke's Venus having arms forged and plenty of Rubens. The Italian masters included Da Vinci, Raphael, Titian, and Veronese, of course. France was represented by Nicola Pousson, Champigner, Usta Chassur, and Charles LeBlanc, and many more. The day after the decree was signed, the commission removed all the paintings held at Chateau Versailles and brought them to Paris. The paintings were hung with the largest at the top of the wall with the smaller at the eye level. They filled each bay almost from frame to frame. While the museum opened on August 10, 1793, it didn't last long. In fact, it only opened for one day. On August 11th, the doors closed and didn't reopen again until November 18, 1793. Outside, the terror was raging through Paris and the government was in total disarray. The Palais de Louvre survived the anger of the revolution and the terror unscathed. The supreme figure of the royal family of Paris was left without a mark because it was given back to the people of France in the middle of one of the darkest times. It was the smartest move they could make. The museum had to close on April 26, 1796, while the building was falling into disrepair. It was one thing to have a public palace turn into a shrine for art. It was another to dip into the purse of the government to keep it going. Over the next five years, it would open and close many times until July 14, 1801, when it was once again fully open for everyone to visit. As time went on, more and more art was added to the museum. The Chateau de Versailles had all the art and paintings of the French school, while the Louvre focused on the few years of the international school, made up mostly of Italian and Northern artists. In November 1800, the Musee des Antiques moved into the summer apartments of Anne of Austria below the Gallery d'Apalon and was inaugurated by Napoleon. He would, of course, rename it the Musee Napoleon. During his rule and even bring the Mona Lisa to his bedroom at the Palais de Tuileries. Today, when you visit the Louvre, the Grand Gallery is still filled with paintings that were picked and adored by the kings of France. However, on this date on August 10th, 1793, 233 years ago, the birth of my beloved Musée de Louvre came to be, and she continues to evolve and grow. The Musee de Louvre is one of the best places in the world, and sometimes it gets a bad rap because it is so big and it is confusing, and there's so much to it. But the other day I went in there specifically to the Grand Gallery just to see how many of the paintings of the kings were there. And if you know how to read the plaques, you will find everything you need to find. And there was quite a few that will say that they were the original collection of Louis XIV. Right after the Louvre opened, they start that is when they started to then add more things later that were coming, as I said, from the families and people that were fleeing France. They had stuff that they were saving from churches, which that's a story for another day because there was also controversy of did you really need to take that? And are we taking that for the right reason? And then we're putting it to the Louvre, and then you won't give it back to the church. So there's all of those questions, just how they were taking the art from the structures within the city and country. But, you know, hopefully if you come to Paris, you go. I hate seeing those lists that say, Don't go to the Louvre, go to this place instead. You should definitely go to the Louvre, even if you only go in there for a little bit. And if you need help on knowing what to do or what to see, reach out to me and I could walk you through what you need to go and I could point out, give you the route. And I've even written up entire things that you could take in there, and people could, you know, go from this painting to this painting, and I'll tell you the whole story, all written out for you. So you could do it whenever you want. But it is an amazing place. I love her dearly. I'm sad that I couldn't spend today with her, but I wanted to get this out on her actual birthday. So she looks pretty good for 233 years, and I hope she's here for another at least 233 years. But until then, I'll be back next week with more about that most famous lady in the Louvre because she also has a pretty big anniversary coming up. So thank you guys so much. And make sure you check out my website for more information, claudyhemiway.com. And if you want, reach out for a tour. I just gave a tour of the Twilleries to a wonderful couple this morning. Two and a half hours of everything about the Twilleries and a little bit about the outside of the Louvre, and so much fun. So if you're coming and you need help planning your trip, let me know and I'd be happy to do all that for you. So until next week, merci beaucoup and A biento.