Galeries nationales of the Grand Palais presents France 1500. Between the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, open through January 10 2011.
The first large-scale event to be dedicated to this key, transitional period, Between the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, is an opportunity to dive deep into the history of France.
In France, during the years 1483-1515, there were several artistic hotbeds: the Loire Valley, home to royalty; further south, the powerful Dukes of Bourbon, patrons of the celebrated painter Jean Hey, “the Master of Moulins”; and also Languedoc, Normandy, and Champagne. The period was marked by vigorous creativity, catalysed by increasingly intensive contact with the rest of Europe. Artists travelled, new works and new approaches could be discovered, and new themes, shapes and motifs adopted.
Jean Hey, Nativité au Cardinal Jean Rolin, vers 1480, huile sur bois, 56,6 x 74,4 cm. Autun, Musée Rolin.
Showing over 200 works, with outstanding loans from French museums and public collections, as well as many prestigious foreign institutions in the USA, Italy, the Netherlands, and the UK, the exhibition is co-produced by the Réunion des musées nationaux and the Louvre Museum and organised jointly with the Art Institute of Chicago. It draws on the very latest research work and discoveries.
The exhibition is organised jointly by the Réunion des musées nationaux and the Art Institute of Chicago, staged in collaboration with the Louvre Museum, the Cluny Museum (the National museum of the Middle Ages) and the National Renaissance Museum in the Château d’Ecouen, with the support of the French National Library.
Commissioners: Elisabeth Taburet-Delahaye, director of the National Museum of the Middle Ages in Paris, Geneviève Bresc-Bautier, Director of the Department of Sculpture in the Louvre Museum, Thierry Crépin-Leblond, Director of the National Renaisssance Museum, Château d’Ecouen, Martha Wolff, curator in charge of pre-1750 European painting at the Art Institute of Chicago.
Opening: everyday from 10 am to 8 pm, late-night opening on Wednesday until 10 pm. Closed on every Tuesday and on December 25. Closing at 6 pm on December 24 and 31.
www.grandpalais.fr
