Čak 80% ljudi koji posećuju Luvr to čine isključivo sa ciljem da vide Leonardovo remek-delo As many as 80% of all people who visit the Louvre do so with the exclusive aim of seeing Leonardo’s masterpiece
LOUVRE AND CULTURAL REVOLUTION After more than two centuries as a royal palace, the Louvre was repurposed in 1793 by the French revoluti- onary government and reopened as a public museum. Its collection is today among the world’s richest, boa- sting artworks and artefacts representing 11,000 years of human civilisation and culture. The Louvre palace was erected on the site of a 12 th -century fortress built by King Philip II. Almost every subsequent French monarch extended the Louvre and its grounds, with major extensions added by Louis XIII and Louis XIV in the 17 th century. Both of these kings al- so greatly expanded the crown’s art holdings. The Lo- uvre ceased to be France’s main royal residence when Louis XIV relocated his court to Versailles in 1682. It was in the spirit of the Enlightenment that many French citizens began calling for royal collections to be put on public display. French writer and philosopher Denis Diderot was among the first to propose a natio- nal art museum for the public. Although King Louis XV placed a selection of paintings on temporary display at the Luxembourg Palace in 1750, it wasn’t until the 1789 outbreak of the French Revolution that real progress was made in establishing a permanent museum. On 10 th August, 1793, the then revolutionary government opened the Musée Central des Arts in the Grande Ga-
Deni Didro bio je među prvima koji su javnosti predložili nacionalni umetnički muzej Denis Diderot was among the first to propose a national art museum for the public
lerie of the Louvre. Two new wings were added in the 19 th century, whi- le the Louvre’s multi-building complex was comple- ted in 1857, during the reign of Napoleon III. The Grand Louvre, as the museum is officially known, underwent major remodelling works in the 1980s and ‘90s, with modern museum amenities added and thousands of square metres of new exhibition space opened. A re- constructed wing that had formerly been occupied by the French ministry of finance was opened to the pu- blic in 1993, on the 200 th anniversary of the museum’s establishment. This marked the first time that the Lo- uvre was devoted entirely to museum purposes.
Tekst / Words: Jelena Pantović Fotografije / Photography: Profimedia.rs, iStock
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