MINISTÈRE DES AFFAIRES ÉTRANGÈRES
N° 42 – november 2012
New galleries devoted to Islamic Art open at the Louvre
A gigantic gilded wing undulates
and barely brushes the ground in the
courtyard of the Louvre museum. Ten
years in the construction, it now houses the
museum’s new galleries devoted to Islamic
Art. Glass, ceramics, miniatures, textiles,
rugs and over 1,200 years of history and
talent are finally on show for all the world
to see.
The visual contrast is dramatic. Behind
the austere windows of the neoclassical building of the former palace of the kings of France, Leonardo
da Vinci’s masterpiece, the Mona Lisa, watches over the museum’s new extension. After the shock of
the transparent glass pyramid erected in 1989 in the extension of the Tuileries gardens, the Louvre
museum has once again taken up the daring challenge of mingling historic monuments with creative
new architecture. The architects who designed the new galleries devoted to Islamic Art wanted the
roof to resemble the delicate wings of a dragonfly. To the visitor’s eye it has the lightness of the
graceful insect or it might remind one of a magical flying carpet that leads gently into the magic of a
peerless collection.
A manifold space
With an additional 3,000 m², the new galleries devote approximately four times more space to
Islamic arts than before. A further 3,500 artworks on
permanent loan from the Musée des Arts Décoratifs
have been added to the Louvre’s own collection,
which already held 14,000 pieces. These additional
pieces, in particular, shed new light on the arts
developed in the Maghreb and India. A stone’s throw
from the Seine and in the heart of Paris, the visitor
can survey a world that extended from Spain to India
and travel through time from the 7th century to the
19th. While the aesthetic coherence of the arts of
Islam enables them to be recognised as such, the collections nevertheless place great emphasis on the
fabulous diversity and creativity within these common themes. Fragile pieces such as manuscripts,
miniatures or textiles and rugs are exhibited in the basement to protect them from the light. Upstairs, in
contrast, sculptures, glassware, wrought-iron work, jewellery and metals are displayed in cleverly
DIRECTION DE LA COMMUNICATION ET DU PORTE-PAROLAT
SOUS-DIRECTION DE LA PRESSE
MINISTÈRE DES AFFAIRES ÉTRANGÈRES
designed corner cabinets that enable the objects to be observed in every dimension and from different
perspectives, providing even more opportunities to marvel at them.
Tradition and commitment
The project to extend the collection, begun ten years ago, is in keeping with the museum’s
tradition. In fact, the first Islamic artworks joined what would become the Louvre museum as far back
as the end of the French Revolution. Some of these artworks came directly from the royal collections,
such as the baptismal basin of St Louis, a masterpiece of inlaid metal made in Syria in the 14th
century, and the series of Ottoman jade dishes that
belonged to Louis XIV. Other works came from the
Royal Abbey of St Denis, where the kings of France
were anointed, such as the remarkable rock crystal
ewer fashioned in Egypt in the early 11th century.
Other donations from private collections have been
added to the museum’s display cabinets over the
years, and in 1893 the Louvre opened a department
dedicated to Muslim art for the first time. To open its
doors to the public this autumn, the project had to rely
on significant financial support. Over €98.5 million
were released by the French government, and other
support has come from generous patrons such as
Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal of Saudi Arabia, but also
from the French oil company Total, the Sultanate of Oman, Morocco, Kuwait and Azerbaijan.
Unusual works of art
This site, impressive both for its size and its ambition, has been illuminated by small miracles.
Three thousand glazed earthenware Ottoman tiles from the 16th and 17th
centuries, relegated to a warehouse for over 30 years, have been
rediscovered and reassembled, a precious historical jigsaw puzzle, to be
finally put on show to the public. Even more unusual, the entrance door to
a Cairo house made from over 300 stones has been reconstructed inside
the museum. This masterpiece, a rare testament to the splendour of the
Mamluk dynasty, had been taken from Egypt to Paris on the occasion of
the 1889 World’s Fair, the same Fair that saw the erection of the Eiffel
Tower. Having reached its destination, the doorway remained boxed up in
separate pieces. It has had to wait until 2012 to be reborn in the French
capital like a Phoenix from its ashes. These myriad artworks come from
Andalusia and the Maghreb, but also from Iraq, Syria and Egypt for the
Ottoman sphere and from as far away as the heart of the Persian world in Bukhara or Samarkand
passing through Afghanistan and the Indian subcontinent. They are a testament to the prolific
creativity and skills of artists and craftsmen. Depending on the period, they worked for private
commissions or on exceptional projects, but they also took great pains to embellish and work on
ordinary, everyday objects and dwellings.
DIRECTION DE LA COMMUNICATION ET DU PORTE-PAROLAT
SOUS-DIRECTION DE LA PRESSE
MINISTÈRE DES AFFAIRES ÉTRANGÈRES
A cultural bridge
The chosen museography is deliberately based on a chronological rather than a geographical
progression, while the name “Islam” is clearly seen as a common denominator not only for a religion
but above all for a culture of many countries and influences. The new galleries thus stress the
interaction and the link between different peoples steeped in a common tradition, and invite the visitor
to cross the bridges between East and West for a greater dialogue of civilisations. A key issue in which
the Louvre, the most popular museum in the world and which received over nine million visitors in
2011, is resolutely engaged.
Pascale Bernard
DIRECTION DE LA COMMUNICATION ET DU PORTE-PAROLAT
SOUS-DIRECTION DE LA PRESSE