Reopening of Rodin Museum-Paris

Reopening of Rodin Museum-Paris
19/11/2015

Reopening of Rodin Museum-Paris

 

The Rodin Museum was inaugurated on November 9th, by Prime Minister, Mr. Manuel Valls and the Minister of Culture and Communication, Madam Fleur Pellerin, and reopened to the public on November 12th.

It took no less than three years to fulfill the need to reinforce the structure of this overburdened 18th century building and adapt it to current technical standards as well as to set up a new museography. The wooden floors, in particular, had not only suffered from an attendance of 700,000 annual visitors, but also from the excessive weight of the works of arts.

 

The major restoration’s achievement is an innovative highlight of the works of this worldwide famous French sculptor, and the presentation of new works inaccessible to the public beforehand.

Authentic example of the rocaille architecture that was fashionable in the early 18th century, listed as a historical monument in 1926, the Hotel Biron had been chosen by Rodin to make it an open place for work and creation as well as for exhibition.

In particular, rather than offering to teach or lecturing the young sculptors who flocked to his studio around 1900, Rodin gave them the opportunity to work, assist and collaborate with him.

The restoration has been designed to fully respect the link between Rodin and the architecture of the place, meaning to maintain the interaction between the galleries and the garden to preserve the play of natural light.

The priority was therefore to restore a warm, intimate and changing lighting and to create an atmosphere that would encourage the visitor’s personal encounter with the object. Thus a very sophisticated computer-controlled lighting system, unique in Europe has been installed: over the hours and the seasons the lighting changes according to the daylight. Internationally known masterpieces such as “The Thinker”, “The Kiss”, are thereby magnified by this new lighting.

 

The newly established museology gives a different look on the museum’s collections and reflects the original creative process of the artist: throughout its eighteen rooms the museum invites visitors on a tour combining a chronological and thematic approach. Among the new features, there is a space entirely dedicated to the collections of graphic and photographic works, which have never been presented previously.

The cabinet of curiosities also exhibits Master’s works, nearly fifty paintings and, for the first time, many pieces from his personal collection of antiques, including more than one hundred ancient fragments.

 

To conclude herewith the key message of Mrs Catherine Chevillot, the director of Rodin’s Museum:

” Exhibiting sculpture, giving it its rightful place, allowing the public to fully appreciate this particular way of apprehending the world was, and still is, the goal of the Musée Rodin, of its scientific and cultural policy, and even of its business model. In our modern age of dematerialized images and virtual or “augmented” reality, we tend to neglect direct confrontation with material objects and forms. By its very nature, sculpture cannot be reduced to an image alone: it takes time to appreciate its various facets, to observe it in changing lights… Whether it bears the marks of the sculptor’s hand or the traces of his research into volume, sculpture is essentially format, material, mass, color… Perhaps today’s viewer needs such confrontations of scale, tangible appearances and palpable objects to finally stop and look, recover an awareness of the self and of its physical limits in real space.”

 

Since this reopening ArtLuxury Experience is delighted to propose the visit of Museum Rodin, we invite you to consult our on-line catalogue.