diam Museums
     
  Rosalie L. Casella Licensed Tour Guide certified by the Ministry of Culture & Tourism
 

Guided Tours in & outside Paris
 
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  MUSEUMS IN PARIS
   
  Musée Bourdelle   This museum located in the gardens and workshops where Antoine Bourdelle (1861-1929) lived and worked, features an exceptional collection of plaster, bronze and marble sculptures. Bourdelle learned from Rodin, and mentored Giacometti’, Richier and de Vieira da Silva. The extension that Christian de Portzamparc built in 1992 captures the full wealth and breadth of this sculptor’s work.  
         
  CAP   Cité de l'Architecture et du Patrimoine. The former Musée des Monuments français, the Institut français d'architecture and the Ecole de Chaillot have merged to form the Cité de l'Architecture et du patrimoine. The Galeriedes moulages presenting life-sized fragments of French architectural masterpieces & the Galerie des peintures murales (wall paintings) et des vitraux (stained glass windows) are completed by a new gallery devoted to architecture from 1851 to the present day.  
         
  Les Invalides,

 

   The Musée de l'Armée, which is both a museum and a monument offers visitors the visit of an exceptional body of works and objects relating to French military history, from the Middles Ages to the XXth century : ancient suits of armour, uniforms, pieces of equipment, sabres, swords, arms and armaments, luxury arms, pieces of ordnance, emblems decorations, historic figurines, musical instruments, paintings, photographs, sculptures, personal effects of great historic figures, etc. The Museum is part of a complex of buildings used for mili tary purposes. The itinerary brings visitors to discover and wander the courtyards and galleries of The Hôtel National des Invalides. It also leads to the the Eglise du Dôme (Dome Chapel) which houses among other graves, the imposing Tomb of Napoleon I .  
         
  Musée des Arts et Métiers   Located in the heart of 3rd arrondissement of Paris, the museum housed in the former mediaval abbey of St-Martin des Champs is presenting the collection of The Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers - Permanent collections are allowing the visitor to discover through chronological order, the history of various techniques and new acquisitions - Displayed in seven principal sections : Scientific instruments, Materials, Construction, Communication, Energy, Engineering and Transportation. Among the highlights of the museum : Lavoisier's gasometers, the cinematograph device by the Frères Lumières, Watt's steam engine, Volta's first invention of battery as well as an 020 type locomotive by Stephenson...  
         
  Centre Pompidou   The Centre Pompidou, the 3rd most visited site in France, laid out in 1977 and located in the Beaubourg district. Designed as an "evolving spatial diagram" by architects Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers, the architecture of the Centre Pompidou boasts a series of technical characteristics that make it unique.More than 60 000 works constitute the largest collection in Europe of modern and contemporary art which covers the XX and XXI centuries. Closely linked to the Centre Pompidou, the BPI, a huge multimedia public library,the Kandinsky Library , documentation and research centre specialised in the arts and all fields of the visual arts, the IRCAM,one of the world's largest public research centres in musical creation, ....Classical or themed visits-  
       
  Musée Carnavalet (*)   The Musée Carnavalet or the historical legacy of Paris - The oldest of the municipal museums tells the story of Paris from a bygone era to the present day in all its immense variety. . Annexed to the museum, the Hôtel Le peletier de Saint Fargeau is dedicated, among other periods, to the French Revolution : archaeological remains, townscapes, scale models, signs, trinkets, curio, decorative ensembles, furniture, portrays...  
       
  Musée Cernuschi (*)   Financier Henri Cernuschi bequeathed to the City of Paris his townhouse skirting Parc Monceau and the handsome assortment of Far-Eastern art that he had collected during his travels.Considered as the 2nd asian art collection in France and the 5th in Europe. This museum features a remarkable collection of Chinese art (Neolithic pottery, antediluvian bronzes, Buddha statues, funerary statuettes, and a stunning collection of 20th-century paintings).  
       
  Musée de Cluny   Based in two exceptional monuments, Gallo-Roman thermal baths dating from the early first millennium and the mansion of the abbots of Cluny dating from the end of the 15th century, the National Museum of the Middle Ages covers nearly 15 centuries of history. While the collections include works form the end of the Roman Empire and the barbarian invasions, they are most known for the very extensive insight they provide into the Roman and Gothic Middle Ages. The everyday life of this period and the arts which were developing at the time – sculpture, illumination, stained glass, gold and silver work, tapestry – are richly presented here.  
       
  Musée Cognacq-Jay

(*)

  Businessman Ernest Cognacq and his wife Marie-Louise Jay gathered this museum's collection between 1900 and 1925. The couple that had founded The Samaritaine department store, spent part of the fortune they had ammassed on works of art and had a penchant for the 18th century French artists. The museum's collections include paintings and sculptures by leading lights (Lemoyne, Chardin and Fragonard) side by side with those of lesser-known masters (Lavreince and Saly). The woodwork, furniture and decorative art encapsulate something about elegant society's lifestyle in those days.  
       
  Musée des Egouts de Paris (*)   Paris as you'd never imagine it : a history of water and mains drainage, and a visit to the heart of the sewerage network.  
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  Musée Guimet   The Guimet Museum of Asian Art  (Musée National des arts asiatiques Guimet), was the brain-child of Emile Guimet (1836-1918), a Lyons industrialist who devised the grand project of opening a museum devoted to the religions, and among them Classical Antiquity, and Asia. The museum is running 3 museums :  
      le Musée Guimet, the largest collections of Asian art in Paris (spaning Afghanistan, Pakistan, the Himalaya, Southeast Asia, China, Korea, India, Japan and more).  
      le Panthéon bouddhique,in an annexe to Musée Guimet, the Buddhist Pantheon, displaying a selection of the original collections brought back from Japan by Emile Guimet. See also the Japonese Garden and Tea House  
      le musée d'Ennery - Attached since 2004, to the AsianArts Guimet Museum public institution. Bequeathed to the state by the playwirht Adolphe Philippe d'Ennery, the museum's collections include objects from the Far East, China, Japan and Vietnam : large animal statues, procelain, paintins in inlaid wood, as welle as a remarkable collection of netsukes, traditional Japanese statuettes.  
       
  Musée Jacquemart-André   Just off the Champs Elysées, discover the sumptuous residence of the Andrés and dazzling collection. The mainsion was built at the end of the 19th century in Haussmann's redesigned Paris When you step into the Jacquemart-André Museum, you are crossing the threshold of the private residence of collectors who devoted their entire life to collecting a tremendous number of works of art. Through The State Apartments reflect thefascination of the couple for the French school of painting and 18th century decorative art, the informal appartments, the winter garden, the Italian Museum, the private apartments (in a Louis XV style), the Picture Gallery : Boucher, Chardin, Nattier, Canaletto, Rembrandt .... last but not least, JA is the only museum in Paris open all year round.  
       
  Musée du Louvre   In turn a Medieval château, palace of the kings of France and then a museum since 1793, the Louvre is one of the leading museums in Europe, with one of the richest collections in the world. Its collections are organized into eight major departments : Oriental Antiquities ; Egyptian Antiquities ; Greek, Etruscan and Roman Antiquities ; Paintings ; Sculptures ; Objets d'art ; Graphic arts ; Islamic arts, with two additionnal sections : African, Oceanian and American Arts and the History of the Louvre.  
       
  Mahj   In the Musée d'Art et d'Histoire du Judaïsme, is displayed a unique collection of artefacts and documents in a beautiful 17th century mansion, the Hôtel de Saint-Aignan. A way to discover the diversity of Jewish communities and understand several essential concepts about Jewish culture. ^
         
  MAM   The Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris or Palais de Tokyo, is a palace built for the 1937 International Exposition which turned into a modern-art museum in 1961. The 8,000+ works in its collection span the sundry trends in 20th-century art. It hosts retrospectives zooming in on the prominent movements and artists that populated the 20th-century artistic scene, and more focused exhibitions showcasing the main trends shaping art today.  
       
  Musée National de la Marine   Anchored at Place du Trocadéro, where it looks across to the Eiffel Tower, the French Maritime Museum, displays its unique collection in the Palais de Chaillot one of the most beautiful monuments of the 1930's. Discover over a thousand extraordinary objects, model ships and machinery, naval souvenirs, figureheads, weapons and navigating instruments, which tell of life onboard ship, and how boats were built and sailors navigated the world from the 17th century to today. All aboard ! Thematic exhibitions, presentend among the permanent collections, add to experience.  
       
  Musée Marmottan Monet   The museum features a collection of over three hundred Impressionist and Post - Impressionist works by Claude Monet (with the largest collection of his works in the world), Berthe Morisot, Edgard Degas, Edouard Manet, Alfred Sisley, Camille Pissarro, Paul Gauguin, Paul Signac and Pierre Auguste Renoir . In addition it houses the Wildenstein Collection of illuminated manuscripts and the Jules and Paul Marmottan collection of Napoleonic era art and furniture as well as Italian and Flemish primitive paintings.  
       
  Musée Nissim de Camondo   One of the most sumptuous private homes from the early twentieth century in Paris
Moïse de Camondo, a reputed Parisian banker during the Belle Epoque, was a passionate collector of French furniture and art objects from the eighteenth century ; he amassed a collection of unusual quality and then had built a private mansion next to Parc Monceau that would be worthy of this collection and suitable for his family. The design was modeled after that of the Petit Trianon in Versailles, but behind the handsome décor of wood-paneled apartments were hidden the accoutrements of modern life, including kitchens, offices and bathrooms.		  
       
  Musée de l'Orangerie   Located in the Tuileries gardens, since 1984 the Orangerie has housed the Jean Walter and Paul Guillaume collection, bequeathed to the state under very generous conditions. The collection includes 144 painting (by Cézanne, Renoir, Matisse, Picasso, Derain, Soutine, Modigliani, Utrillo, Henri Rousseau, etc.) from the end of the 19th century to the first half of the 20th century. It assembled the eight immense Nimphea compositions which Monet donated to France in 1922 an which have been installed since 1927 in two large oval rooms especially adapted to house them, under instructions from the the painter.  
       
  Musée d'Orsay   The world renowned museum of Impressionism ; housed in the refitted Orsay railway station built for the Universal Exhibition in 1900, the museum opened its doors in 1986. As well as traditional fields of art (painting, sculpture, graphic arts, objects d'art) its collections also include works from disciplines such as architecture, furniture and photography. They therefore cover a wide spectrum of French and European art from 1848 to 1914.  
       
  Musée du Petit Palais (*)   A fully-refurbished venue brimming with 1900 modernity and a new collection layout drenched in light – and a gorgeous winter garden featuring mosaic-trimmed ponds and colonnades, opening out onto a café and restaurant.  
         
  Musée Picasso   Since 1985 the museum has been housed in one of the largest private mansions in the Marais, the Hôtel Salé, which takes its name from the fact that it was built in the 17th century for a salt tax collector. Established in 1979 to receive the gift from the Picasso estate, the museum has since been added to by numerous acquisitions. It houses a unique collection of works by the great master (paintings, sculptures, drawings, engravings, ceramics, etc) spanning his entire career as well as his personal collection (primitive art, paintings by Cézanne, Henri Rousseau, Matisse, Braque, Balthus, etc.)  
       
  Musée Rodin   The magnificient 18th century mansion of the Hôtel Biron was due to be demolished at he start of the 20th century when several artists moved in, including Jean Cocteau, Henri Matisse, Isadora Duncan and Auguste Rodin, on the advice of Rainer-Maria Rilke. When the state acquired the property in 1911, Rodin offered to donate all his works and collections, provided the the state allocated them to the Hotel Biron, along with its gardens, to become the Rodin Museum. It dispalys the multiple facets of the artist's talent : his marble and bronze sculptures (casts kept in Meudon) as well as his drawings, paintings and engravings and the works in his personal collection . Furthermore, around 15 sculptures by Camille Claudel. (About Rodin & Camille Claudel's life, see the film/ Bruno Nuytten/1988 "Camille Claudel with Isabelle Adjani & Gérard Depardieu)  
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  La Villette, Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie,   Explora : Science and society The City of Sciences presents a host of attractions combining science and leisure activities, with exhibitions, a multimedia library, lectures and forums, cultural outreach, coverage of the latest science news, resource centers and unrivalled scope for children.
 
       
  Palais de Soubise   A Rocaille's style jewel in the very heart of the Marais district - Located within the Hotel of the Princes of Soubise, the Museum of the History of France is housing the headquarters of French National Archives and displaying some very important documents relating to the history of France. Five sections articulate your visit around the Cabinet Iron French documents, foreign documents, exhibits and artifacts. The visit takes you into the room decorated by Germain Boffrand in a Louis XV's style. Therein is preserved the original Declaration of Human Rights.  
       
  Victor Hugo (*)   The City of Paris has kept the two houses where Victor Hugo lived the longest : Hôtel de Rohan-guéménée on Place des Vosges, where the writer lived from 1832 to 1848 in Paris and Hauteville House in Guernsey, where he lived in exile, from 1855 to 1870.  
         
     
(*) The entrance to all permanent collections of the municipal museums is free for the public. Only temporary exhibitions, archeologic crypt and Catacombes are charged. See >> Free  
         
         
  PARIS SURROUNDINGS  
         
       
  Basilique de Saint-Denis   The Basilica Cathedral of Saint-Denis near Paris, is the first monumental masterpiece of Gothic art. Discover the Royal necropolis and its collection of 70 sculpted recumbent statues - the only set of its kind in Europe - bathed in the multi-coloured light of the 12 th, 13th and 19th century stained glass windows.
     
  Chantilly   The Château Chantilly is one of the most picturesque castles in the region. It sits on a artifical lake, and is surrounded by attractive parkland, with the Chantilly forest in the background.
Musée Condé is stuffed with palace furniture, family portraits, and Sèvres porcelains. It's a great place for lovers of horses and riding too. The Living Horse Museum and the Chantilly stables are famous.		 ^
     
  Fontainebleau   Justifying the title "House of the centuries, true home of kings" which Napoleon bestowed on it, the Château de Fontainebleau offers the memory of more than 700 years'presence of French sovereigns, from the enthronement of Louis 7 in 1137 up to the fall of the Second Empire in 1870. Francis 1st in particular, using Italian artists (Rosso Fiorentino and Francesco Primaticcio in particular) to decorate the château he had built, introduced art from the French Renaissance. Then under the reign of Henry IV, new works were undertaken, which by encouraging the emergence of the Second School of Fontainebleau, ennobled French art.
     
  Barbizon   The name alone brings to mind idyllic countryside, the pleasures of living close to nature and the beauty of the unparalleled forest of Fontainebleau - the country seat and hunting preserve of the kings of France.
Now an internationally-renowned place of residence and tourism, the village of yesteryear, so beloved of artists, is still in evidence.
At the time of the 19th-century landscape artists, Barbizon was a humble hamlet, but its subsequent artistic renown has spread its fame worldwide.
     
  Chateaux de Malmaison and de Bois-Préau   Dating back from the 17 th and 18th century, the mansion was acquired in 1799 by Josephine Bonaparte to become the residence of the First Consul and his wife, then the seat of French government, along with the Tuileries, from 1800 to 1802. With the neighbouring Château of Bois-Préau, the two residences, transformed into a museum are dedicated to Napoleonic history.
     
  Versailles   Despite the many royall estates he owned, it was in Versailles that in 1661 Louis 14th chose to build a château worthy of his prestige. Using the team which had built Vaulx-le-Vicomte, the king began the largest construction project which would employ up to 36 000 workers. In 1682, the Sun King and his court officially moved to Versailles and the château will remain the residence of the kings of France up to the French Revolution.
     
  Themed Versailles   Themed visits of the State Apartments, Gardens, Trianon Palaces, The Queen Hamlet, the King's Gardens
         
  Vaux-le-Vicomte   The Vaux le Vicomte estate forms a unique whole that spans nearly 500 ha. It is testament to an era and the fruit of the bold vision of Nicolas Fouquet, Superintendent of Finances, under Louis XIV, the Sun King. Discover its fascinating history, from plots agains the royal court to the outstanding achievements of iconic 17th century artists, as Louis Le Vau, Charles Le Brun, André Le Nôtre, the king's garderner and garderner's king.
         
 
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