The Louvre museum, a former palace of the kings of France, is now the largest and most visited museum in the world. The Louvre is the home of some of the best-known works of art. Some 35,000 works of art and artefacts are on display, split into eight departments and housed in three wings: Denon, Sully and Richelieu The museum covers almost 10,000 years of history and has an area of 72,735 sq.m. The Louvre has four entrances. Currently, only I.M. Pei Pyramid and Passage Richelieu are open. It's advisable to book in advance a time slot on www.ticketlouvre.fr to guarantee your admission to the museum. It is open from 9 AM to 6 PM throughout the week, except on Tuesdays. The masterpiece of Greek sculpture from the Hellenistic era is originally found on the island of Samothrace. It is composed of a statue representing the goddess Nike (Victory), whose head and arms are missing, and its base in the shape of a ship's bow. The world's most famous painting, the Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci, is housed in the Louvre's largest room, the Salle des États - Denon wing, Level 1 The Salle des États is also home to other remarkable 16th. c. Venetian paintings such as The Wedding Feast at Cana by Veronese. Mona Lisa's famously enigmatic smile has fascinated viewers for centuries. King François I , who invited Leonardo da Vinci to France bought the painting from him in 1518. This is how the painting entered the royal collections that have been shown at the Louvre since the French Revolution. The Mona Lisa measures only 53 by 77 centimeters. To ensure the safety and conservation, it is exhibited in bullet-proof glass and flanked by guards. Leonardo da Vinci never finished the Mona Lisa. The lower part of the landscape is evidently incomplete. At over 6 m. high and almost 10 m. wide, The Wedding Feast at Cana is the biggest painting in the Louvre. Louvre's most dazzling hall shimmers in paintings, tapestries, jewels, gilded embellishments, and statues. King Louis XIV famously identified himself with the sun god Apollo and this splendid gallery was the first tangible representation of that image. Necklace and earrings from a set of emerald jewellery belonging to Empress Marie Louise,
the second wife of Napoleon I, Emperor of the French from 1804 -1814 The Galerie d’Apollon was decorated by some of the greatest French artists including Le Brun , Girardon , Lagrenée and and Eugene Delacroix. The hall became the prototype of the Hall of Mirror at the Palace of Versailles. The Consecration of the Emperor Napoleon and the Coronation of the Empress Josephine in Notre-Dame cathedral on 2 December 1804. Author: Jacques Louis DAVID ; Oil on Canvas, 1806-1807, Salon of 1808 Leonidas at Thermopylae; Oil on Canvas, 1814; Author: Jacques Louis DAVID Equestrian Portrait of Joachim Murat, King of Naples from 1808 to 1815; Author Antoine Jean Gross 28 July 1830: Liberty Leading the People; Author: Eugène Delacroix; Oil on Canvas, Salon of 1831
The painting depicts the July revolution of 1830 that overthrew King Charles X Michelangelo Buonarroti - Captive ( The Rebellious Slave ) and Captive (The Dying Slave) Marble; Made in 1513-1515 for the tomb of Pope Julius II Satyrs, known as the ”Albani Atlantes” ; Marble Fountain with satyrs, gardens of the Vila Albani, Rome, after Domenico Magnani (1775 ) Together with the Mona Lisa and The Winged Victory of Samothrace, the Venus de Milo is one of the three most famous female figures in the Louvre Her name comes from the Greek island of Melos, where she was found in 1820. She was acquired by the French ambassador to Greece, who then presented her to King Louis XVIII, who donated her to the Louvre in March 1821. The lack of arms made it hard to identify the statue. The suggestions are that she is either Aphrodite, the goddess of beauty or the sea goddess Amphitrite. Aphrodite, known as the “Venus of Arles” ; Marble Athena, known as 'Pallas of Velletri' 1797; Marble, The Male Nude in Classical Greek sculpture (430-370 BC) - Statues of Arès Borghèse ( god of war ) Hermes ( god of travellers) and Diomedes ( a Greek hero from the Trojan war ) Old centaur tormented by Eros (Cupid), god of love Apollo Sauroctonus (Lizard-Slayer) - The god of the arts, shown as an adolescent, prepares to kill a lizard Artemis, goddess of the hunt, known as the “Diana of Versailles” The Richelieu Wing is the lesser-visited part of the Louvre. Here visitors will discover magnificent sculptures, Second Empire apartments, monumental French and northern European canvases, arts of Islam, Mesopotamia, and ancient Iran. Hercules fighting Achelous transformed into a snake - Bronze, 1824 Napoleon Awakening to Immortality (1846). When Napoleon's ashes were returned to France in 1840, the sculptor Francois Rude produced a bronze monument in honour of the emperor. There is a underground shopping centre - Carrousel du Louvre.
