The Orangery Museum

The Musée de l'Orangerie, one of the most beautiful museums of paintings in Paris

• The Orangery Museum, was once an orangery, a place where oranges were stored to preserve them well
• It is now a museum, dedicated mainly to French painting between 1860 and 1930
• It is in our opinion one of the most beautiful museums of paintings in Paris
• A small but fascinating museum located in the Tuileries Gardenon the esplanade above the Concorde
• We love this museum relatively unknown which counts the spectacular Monet's Water Lilies and an exceptional collection of impressionist and post impressionist works (French painting from 1860 to 1930)
• In addition to the permanent collections, the Musée de l'Orangerie presents often fascinating exhibitions

The Water Lilies, spectacular and unique in the world

• Claude Monet, with the help of Georges Clémenceau, chose the Musée de l'Orangerie to house the Water Lilies cycle, a cycle he had begun thirty years earlier
• This unique set is one of the largest monumental achievements of painting in the first half of the twentieth century. This unique masterpiece has no equivalent anywhere in the world
• 2 rooms are specially designed to accommodate the 8 famous paintings of Claude Monet. They benefit from natural light from the glazed roof and their east-west orientation places them symbolically in the path of the sun
• Monet wanted the visitor to be able to immerse himself completely in the painting and forget the outside world.
• The first room gathers four compositions showing the reflections of the sky and the vegetation in the water, from morning to evening, while the second room gathers paintings with the contrasting effect of the willow branches bordering the water.