Paris to Atlanta: Skip the Louvre and
Just Go to Georgia

Story by Christine Tibbetts

Never before seen on exhibit. And I stood in front of them myself.

That’s the remarkable reality today with centuries-old works of art collected by the kings of France and now on display in the southeastern United States, at the High Museum of Art in Atlanta. Go soon and go often to experience exquisite treasures.

Paintings and sculpture from the Louvre are there too, their first trip outside of Paris in this unprecedented $18 million exchange.

Museums are generous places which often share treasures from their collections with one another, but never before has the world’s foremost art museum allowed these works outside the door since it opened in 1793 in Paris.

Atlanta’s the place for an art holiday

For three years, nine different exhibitions will be seen in Louvre Atlanta but the never-before-seen-on-exhibit drawings return home Jan. 28. They come from the Louvre’s collection of 135,000 drawings collected by Kings Louis XIV, XV and XVI, such a volume that many must stay in storage in the Cabinet des Dessins, High Museum Chief Curator David Brenneman told me.

Decorative Arts of the Kings replace them…. none of which has ever been exhibited in America.

When I peered closely at the Raphael drawing of an angel’s head I saw pin pricks put there by the artist to secure the drawing to a sticky wall, dust it with black powder and transfer the shape to become a fresco.

That angel ended up in the Vatican. Nose to nose with Raphael’s original drawing, also called a cartoon, which has never before been exhibited, and thinking of the final product in the Vatican as I stood in Atlanta was an overwhelming joyous event, and I’m going back for more.

Glorious objects present daily life

When the 58 masterwork drawings leave the High Museum Jan. 28, 2007, splendid objects of the three kings’ daily life in Versailles and the Louvre when it was a palace – tapestries, porcelain, silver, bronze, furniture, gilt chandeliers, glass and other everyday items for these kings and their courts – arrive in Atlanta, opening Mar. 3.

Among them is a pair of soft paste porcelain Sevres Pots-Pourris crafted in 1755.

Continuing in place while the drawings and decorative arts swap sides of the ocean are Louvre Atlanta’s The Kings as Collectors exhibition.

This is where you see “one of the greatest portraits of all time,” according to Musee du Louvre Curator Olivier Meslay. The “Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione,” in fact, is the only work Louvre officials deemed worthy of hanging in the place reserved for the Mona Lisa when she was missing for two years.

A gift to Louis XIV in 1664, this work by Raphael presents intense blue eyes, calm face, folded hands and a contrasting texture of velvet cloak and furry beard. I’ve gazed at the Mona Lisa in Paris and I felt the same captivation staring at the Castiglione portrait in Atlanta. This Raphael returns to Paris Jan. 28.

Taking its place in the hall with the “The Infanta Margarita” by Diego Valazquez, and masterworks by Rembrandt, Reni and Murillo will be Nicolas Poussin’s “Et in Arcadia Ego,” considered the defining example of French classicism, an oil on canvas painted from 1638-1640.

Audio tour kicks in fun stories

Looking was fun enough but I learned a lot with the audio tour, complete with French accents and the occasional French word. Want depth? Punch up the adult track and follow the prompts for layers of information behind the basics, kind of an audio web surf.

Prefer just the fun stories? Listen to the children’s track. I did both and stayed six hours in the galleries designed for perhaps a two-hour visit.

Paintings like these were enjoyed only by royalty in the privacy of their palaces until Louis XVI decided the public should share in the beauty.

The 18th century public cared about art, music and discussions and Louis XVI changed the Louvre from a palace to a museum. He and his grandfather Louis XV - great grandson of Louis XIV - built their collections as a duty, believing kings should encourage art.

As patrons, they also declared themselves the owners of complete collections when court artists died. Their massive collections and how they came together is a big part of the story being told these three years with works of the Louvre at the High Museum

Louis XIV loved bronzes and I strolled among a dozen or so, including the four-foot tall gilded “Jupiter Striking Down the Titans” by Alessandro Algardi. This intimate gallery helped me know the three kings a little better because their images hang side by side on larger-than-life size banners with a bronze sculpture in front reflecting each king’s personality.

Walk among rows of marble busts on the ground floor of this three-story exhibition. These 26 men and women from history and myth have never all been together before, according to Isabelle Lemaistre, Musee du Louvre curator.

“To show them all together here is very special,” she says, “for they are in separate galleries in Paris. Here at the High it is interesting to see the different styles of the centuries from one row to the next.” The first floor walls are glass. When I looked outside, past a 1600s bronze of Homer to the subway station or over the shoulder of the 1828 sculpture by Cavasse of Guido Reni (whose paintings are on the third floor), there was a pop art Roy Lichtenstein house in the courtyard.

Connecting the centuries is exactly what Louvre Atlanta allows. Visit a piece of Paris in Atlanta until September, 2009.

Louvre Atlanta Schedule

“This is a project of considerable depth presenting nine exhibitions from collections spanning more than six centuries. We are introducing ourselves in a spectacular fashion to the southeast.”
               -Henri Loyrette, President Director Musee du Louvre

• The Royal Collection “Kings as Collectors”through September 2, 2007 Many works never before seen in America.

• The Louvre and the Ancient World October 2007 – September 2008 Works from the Napoleonic reign and Enlightenment including Egyptian, Near Eastern and Greco-Roman antiquities. Portraiture by Jean-Antoine Houdon including Voltaire, Diderot, George Washington and Benjamin Franklin.
  
• The Louvre of Today and Tomorrow October 2008 – September 2009

For help before you go

High Museum of Art
Enormous schedule of school programs, films, symposia, student exchanges, performances and publications developed jointly in Paris and Atlanta. 404-733-4444

Louvre Atlanta Interactive Web Opportunity
The unprecedented three-year partnership between the High Museum of Art in Atlanta and the Louvre du Musee in Paris can be experienced in interactive ways.

Atlanta Convention and Visitor’s Bureau
800-Atlanta City Pass Atlanta includes admission to the High Museum of Art

PHOTO CREDITS

High Museum of Art