Lecture Series: The Making of the Great Museums of Paris—From 1900 Until Today

Following our previous Zoom series during the winter of 2024 tracing the history and heritage of the extraordinary museums that were established in Paris starting during the Revolution and continuing through the end of the 19th century, we continue the story over the past 125 years with, after an introductory lecture, presentations by the curators and directors of a “house museum”, a “Presidential museum”, a “private museum”, a brand-new museum still in the making, and by a “universal museum.

Lecture: The Making of the Great Museums of Paris—The Making & Remaking of the Centre Pompidou

Arthur Dayras will explain how the Pompidou Center of Contemporary Art, located in its iconic building on the Beaubourg plateau designed by Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers, came to be the first “presidential museum”, the reasons for the renovation of the museum that will start in 2026 and continue until 2030, how the museum’s ambitious cultural program “Constellation” will enable it to operate during the five years of renovation works, and how the museum will be transformed after the works have been completed.