The Douanier Rousseau. Archaic Candour.

22 March - 17 July 2016
http://www.musee-orsay.fr

An extremely unusual painter, Henri Rousseau is a unique figure in the history of European art. His work is, however, in keeping with his time, the dawn of the 20th century : the exhibition compares his painting with several of his sources of inspiration, which included both academic painting and new painting, and with the avant-garde artists who enthroned him as the father of modernity, The Douanier Rousseau. Archaic Candour is a critical investigation of his art based on a consideration of the notion of archaism.

Splendour and Misery. Pictures of Prostitution in France (1850-1910)

22 September 2015 - 17 January 2016
http://www.musee-orsay.fr/

The first major show on the subject of prostitution, this exhibition attempts to retrace the way French and foreign artists, fascinated by the people and places involved in prostitution, have constantly sought to find new pictorial resources for depicting the realities and fantasies it implied.

From Manet's Olympia to Degas's Absinthe, from Toulouse-Lautrec and Munch's forays into brothels to the bold figures of Vlaminck, Van Dongen or Picasso, the exhibition focuses on showing the central place held by this shady world in the development of modern painting. The topic is also covered with regard to its social and cultural dimensions through Salon painting, sculpture, decorative arts décoratifs and photography. A wealth of documentary material recalls the ambivalent status of prostitutes, from the splendour of the demi-mondaine to the misery of the pierreuse (street walker).

Dolce Vita? Italian Decorative Art 1900–1940, from the Liberty to Industrial Design

14 April - 13 September
http://www.musee-orsay.fr

In Italy in the early twentieth century the decorative arts were used to interpret the desire for progress of a nation that had only just found its unity. Cabinetmakers, ceramicists and glass-makers all worked together with the leading artists, creating a veritable "Italian style".

This period of extraordinary creativity is recalled through around a hundred works in a chronological display. The "Liberty" style, which came into its own at the turn of the century, is recalled with designs by Carlo Bugatti, Eugenio Quarti and Federico Tesio mixed with works by the Divisionist painters. A second section is devoted to Futurism, its esthetic inspired by progress and speed extending to every aspect of life.

Later, the return to classicism in Italy came in various guises, finding its expression in the ceramics of Gio Ponti or the glass creations of Carlo Scarpa, up to the stern language of the "Novecento".
Meanwhile, the rationalist style marked the advent of modern "design".

Pierre Bonnard. Peindre l'Arcadie

17 mars - 19 juillet 2015
http://www.musee-orsay.fr

Après les expositions Bonnard organisées dans le monde entier, le musée d'Orsay se devait de lui consacrer une rétrospective représentative de toutes les périodes de sa création.
Pratiquant l'art sous des formes multiples – peinture, dessin, estampe, art décoratif, sculpture, photographie –, Bonnard a défendu une esthétique essentiellement décorative, nourrie d'observations incisives et pleines d'humour tirées de son environnement immédiat.

Du tableautin au grand format, du portrait à la nature morte, de la scène intime au sujet pastoral, du paysage urbain au décor antique, l'oeuvre de Bonnard nous révèle un artiste instinctif et sensible.
Sa palette aux couleurs vives et lumineuses en fait l'un des principaux acteurs de l'art moderne et un représentant éminent du courant arcadien.

7 ans de réflexion. Dernières acquisitions

18 novembre 2014 - 22 février 2015
http://www.musee-orsay.fr

Sept ans de réflexion est une exposition qui rassemble les pièces majeures acquises par le musée d'Orsay pendant les sept dernières années. Une telle exposition permet d'apprécier les enjeux de la politique d'enrichissement des collections nationales.

Le budget annuel des acquisitions du musée d'Orsay, abondé par un prélèvement de 16 % du droit d'entrée des collections permanentes, reste important au regard de nombre d'établissements nationaux moins favorisés ; il est toutefois très éloigné des réalités du marché international, particulièrement en ce qui concerne la peinture de la période d'Orsay (1848-1914). Les acquisitions reflètent à la fois les arbitrages collégiaux fondamentaux et la justesse d'une politique qui doit saisir les opportunités judicieuses.

Cette exposition a pour but de mettre en avant les perles qui rejoignent les cimaises de notre établissement pour la délectation des visiteurs.

Sade. Attaquer le soleil

14 octobre 2014 - 25 janvier 2015
http://www.musee-orsay.fr/ 

Alphonse Donatien de Sade (1740-1814) a bouleversé l'histoire de la littérature comme celle des arts, de manière clandestine d'abord puis en devenant un véritable mythe.
L'oeuvre du "Divin Marquis" remet en cause de manière radicale les questions de limite, proportion, débordement, les notions de beauté, de laideur, de sublime et l'image du corps. Il débarrasse de manière radicale le regard de tous ses présupposés religieux, idéologiques, moraux, sociaux.
Suivant l'analyse d'Annie Le Brun, spécialiste de Sade et commissaire invitée, l'exposition met en lumière la révolution de la représentation ouverte par les textes de l'écrivain. Seront abordés les thèmes de la férocité et de la singularité du désir, de l'écart, de l'extrême, du bizarre et du monstrueux, du désir comme principe d'excès et de recomposition imaginaire du monde, à travers des oeuvres de Goya, Géricault, Ingres, Rops, Rodin, Picasso…

Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux (1827-1875)

24th June 2014 - 30th September 2014

www.musee-orsay.fr/en/home.html#sthash.okyVoHFF.dpuf

www.musee-orsay.fr

Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux, the son of a stonemason and a lace maker from Valenciennes, built an exceptional career closely linked to the “fête impériale” of Napoleon III’s reign.  Standing out vividly in the artistic milieu of his time, he was also one of the most perfect embodiments of the Romantic idea of the artist cursed by the brevity and brilliance of his career, concentrated into around fifteen years, and by the violence and the passion of an unrelenting struggle with subjects chosen or commissioned (the Pavillon de Flore in the Louvre, The Dance for Charles Garnier’s Opera).

The sculptor of smiling subjects, painter of movement, outstanding portraitist, familiar artist of the Cour des Tuileries, attentive observer of the realities of street life and also a sensitive admirer of Michelangelo, Carpeaux was constantly immersed in sombre melancholy, using broad brushstrokes from his earliest days, for the tragedy of Ugolin eating his own children, and, later, for the ghostly flashes of a religious feeling imbued with anxiety, the violence of shipwreck scenes and for sorrowful self-portraits.

The first retrospective since 1975 devoted to his works as a sculptor, painter and illustrator, this exhibition will explore the varied work of a major figure of French sculpture in the second half of the 19th century who, according to Alexandre Dumas, was “more alive than life itself”.

Vincent van Gogh/ Antonin Artaud. The Man Suicided by Society

11th March 2014 - 15th June 2014
www.musee-orsay.fr/

A few days before the opening of a van Gogh exhibition in Paris in 1947, gallery owner Pierre Loeb suggested that Antonin Artaud (1896-1948) write about the painter. Challenging the thesis of alienation, Artaud was determined to show how van Gogh’s exceptional lucidity made lesser minds uncomfortable.
Wishing to prevent him from uttering certain "intolerable truths", those who were disturbed by his painting drove him to suicide.

Based on the categories and the unusual designations put forward by Artaud in Van Gogh, the Man Suicided by Society, , the exhibition will comprise some thirty paintings, a selection of van Gogh's drawings and letters, together with graphic works by the poet-illustrator.

Gustave Doré (1832-1883). The Power of the Imagination

www.musee-orsay.fr
11th February 2014 - 11th May 2014

Gustave Doré is without doubt one of the most prodigious artists of the 19th century. At barely fifteen years of age he began a career as a caricaturist and then professional illustrator – which brought him international fame – before embracing all areas of creativity: drawing, painting, watercolour, engraving and sculpture.
Doré also applied his immense talent to different genres, from satire to history painting, delivering in turn, enormous canvases and more intimate paintings, flamboyant watercolours, virtuoso washes, incisive pen and ink drawings, engravings, fanciful illustrations, as well as Baroque, humorous, monumental and enigmatic sculptures.

As an illustrator, Doré set himself the challenge of the greatest texts (the Bible, Dante, Rabelais, Perrault, Cervantes, Milton, Shakespeare, Hugo, Balzac, Poe), which turned him into a real purveyor of European culture. He thus occupies a special place in contemporary collective imagination, from van Gogh to Terry Gilliam, not to mention his undoubted influence on comic books; there are many aspects that this first retrospective in thirty years will explore.

Allegro Barbaro. Béla Bartók and Hungarian Modernity 1905 -1920

15th October 2013 - 5th January 2014
www.musee-orsay.fr

Continuing with events at the Musée d’Orsay on great figures in modern music – Mahler andDebussy - this exhibition will give the French public an opportunity to discover a particularly vibrant period in Hungarian cultural and artistic life, through Béla Bartók (1881-1945), the man and his music.

In the early 20th century, musicians and painters in Hungary shared a desire to seek new forms of expression and a renewal with tradition. Breaking new ground within the European avant-garde, in just a few years they created their own distinctive idiom, a modernity imbued with the traditions of Hungary.

With around one hundred paintings from public collections in Hungary and from private collections, including numerous documents relating to the young Bartók and to the musicians, composers, writers, poets, philosophers and psychoanalysts in his circle (musical scores, photographs, films, archive recordings, etc), the exhibition aims to revive this rich dialogue between music and the arts from early 20th century Hungary.

This exhibition takes place under the high patronage of Monsieur François Hollande, President of the French Republic, and János Áder, President of the Republic of Hungary.

Masculine / Masculine. The Nude Man in Art from 1800 to the Present Day.

www.musee-orsay.fr
24th September 2013 - 2nd January 2014

As surprising as it may seem, it wasn’t untilNäckte Männer [Nude Men], organised by the Leopold Museum in Vienna (October 2012-March 2013), that a major exhibition tackled the representation of the nude man, a theme that is nonetheless a key element in Western art.

With Masculine / Masculine, the Musée d'Orsay wanted to continue this project and to show that declarations of aesthetic faith, dogma and artistic attitudes of the 19th century relating to male nudity, have their origins in the Classicism of the 18th century, an influence that continues today.

Organised around powerful themes, the exhibition establishes a genuine dialogue between paintings, sculptures, graphic arts and photographs, weaving threads through different eras with unexpected yet productive confrontations, and where contemporary works shed new light on previous centuries.

Une passion française. La collection Marlene et Spencer Hays

16.04. – 18.08.2013
http://www.musee-orsay.fr

Un couple d'amateurs d'art américains, amoureux de la culture française, a réuni pendant plusieurs décennies un ensemble exceptionnel d'oeuvres du XIXe siècle et du début du XXe siècle.

Les liens d'amitié tissés entre les propriétaires et le président des musées d'Orsay et de l'Orangerie permettent aujourd'hui la présentation de cette collection. Parmi celle-ci se trouve le septième panneau des Jardins publics d'Edouard Vuillard, dont le musée d'Orsay conserve déjà cinq des neufs panneaux, mais aussi des oeuvres de Bonnard, de Ranson, de Roussel, ainsi que plusieurs peintures envoûtantes de Vuillard ou encore des panneaux décoratifs de Maurice Denis ainsi que deux chefs-d'oeuvre symbolistes de Redon. Les années 1860 et la période impressionniste sont bien représentées avec des oeuvres signées Fantin-Latour, Tissot, Caillebotte, Berthe Morisot, Eva Gonzalès. Couvrant un large spectre de la création, la collection se clôt chronologiquement avec Derain, Matisse et Modigliani. La plupart de ces oeuvres retournent pour la première fois en France, dans leur pays de création. La venue de la collection au musée d'Orsay permettra non seulement de découvrir des oeuvres majeures d'artistes universellement connus mais aussi des trésors plus secrets, témoins du goût sûr et indépendant de leurs propriétaires.

The Angel of the Odd. Dark Romanticism from Goya to Max Ernst

05.03 - 09.06.2013
http://www.musee-orsay.fr

Arnold BöcklinShield with Gorgon's head© RMN (Musée d'Orsay) / Hervé Lewandowski
It was in the 1930s that the Italian writer and art historian Mario Praz (1896-1982) first highlighted the dark side of Romanticism, thus naming a vast swathe of artistic creation, which from the 1760s onwards exploited the shadows, excesses and irrational elements that lurked behind the apparent triumph of enlightened Reason.

This world was created in the English Gothic novels of the late 18th century, a genre of literature that fascinated the public with its penchant for the mysterious and the macabre. The visual arts quickly followed suit: many painters, engravers and sculptors throughout Europe vied with the writers to create horrifying and grotesque worlds: Goya and Géricault presented us with the senseless atrocities of war and the horrifying shipwrecks of their time, Füssli and Delacroix gave substance to the ghosts, witches and devils of Milton, Shakespeare and Goethe, whereas C.D. Friedrich and Carl Blechen cast the viewer into enigmatic, gloomy landscapes, reflecting his fate.

Following the first stage of the exhibition at the Städel Museum in Frankfurt, the Musée d’Orsay plans to present the many different expressions of Dark Romanticism, from Goya and Füssli to Max Ernst and the Expressionist films of the 1920s, through a selection of 200 works that includes paintings, graphic works and films.