#musee des invalides

[dispatchvampire]

One of my favorite places in the world. & my favorite museum. They have cannons! So. Many. Cannons.

Pont Alexandre III and Les Invalides. Paris (by David)

[sigitheunicorn]

21st-24th October 2024: Disneyland Paris & Paris🗼💕

(4/4)

[haute-lifestyle-com]

Cultival and the Musée de l'Armée - Invalides are set to launch a new immersive multimedia experience created by the Moment Factory studio at the Dôme des Invalides. Aura Invalides will open on 22 September for several seasons.

[liminalmemories21]

Hello! Happy nice ask week! I would love to know: If TK and Carlos were teleported onto your doorstep and they had to spend the day with you, where would you take them and what would you get up to?

Okay, I'm taking liberties with this, because if (when) I finish Knave4 I have a knave-ficlet I want to write about them going to Paris.

So, we all go to Paris, and we stay near the Jardin Luxembourg,a nd start our day with fresh croissants au beurre, and then the Musee D'Orsay, and then ice cream at Berthillon and Ste Chapelle. And, we go to the Place des Vosges for coffee, and wander through the Palais Royale.

We do not go to the Louvre, or the Tour Eiffel (we look at it from across the river like sane people). We go to Les Invalides to look at the courtyard, and then to the Musee Rodin and actually go inside. We go to the Marche aux Fleurs, and we wander down the banks of the Seine (which they have made pedestrian, which is mindbogglingly amazing) and poke our heads in bouquinistes if they have something interesting.

And we definitely go to dinner one night at the Breton crepe place in St Germain. And we go to the market on the rue Cler and bring home cheese and bread and pate and fruit for dinner one night (and wine for me and Carlos).

I need to go back to Paris.

[intheshadowofwar]

5 July 2023

The First Man

Paris 5 July 2023

At 11am on the 11th of November 1918, the guns fell silent - on the Western Front, at any rate. The Russian Civil War, with British, French and American intervention forces, still raged, and violence in Germany, the Baltic, the Balkans, Turkey and the Middle East would continue well into the 1920s. Then there were the millions who had survived the war only to be struck down by the Spanish Flu, whose spread had been accelerated by the movement of armies.

For those who had survived the trenches and the 1918 Offensives, though, it was finally, truly over. Some men cheered. Others regarded the end with stunned silence. I remember reading a quote in Peter Hart’s book on the last month or so on the war - I think it’s called The Last Battle. Some Australian officers wait together as their pocket watches strike the hour. Silence falls over them, until at last one of them speaks; “What now?”

What now indeed? The men had to be demobilised, and the dead properly interred. A sense of grief enough to flood the world had to be processed. Some, of course, had no body to bury; their sons had been blasted to ribbons by shrapnel. Surrogate graves were needed.

As early as 1916, the idea of entombing a private soldier in the Pantheon in Paris had been proposed. This was proposed in the French Parliament less than a week after the armistice, and signed into law in September 1919. At some point, the site of this ‘unknown soldier’ was shifted from the Pantheon to the heart of French military glory, the Arc de Triomphe. Eight bodies were taken of eight of France’s bloodiest battlefields to the very heart of French resistance, the city of Verdun, and Corporal Auguste Thin was chosen to pick one of the coffins. He chose number six, based on his regiment - the 132nd. One plus three plus two.

The body arrived at the Arc de Triomphe on Armistice Day 1920, but was not buried under that great arch until January 1921. In 1923, a sacred flame was placed at the head of his tomb. The flame is rekindled each evening at 6.30pm - even in the Nazi Occupation, this ceremony was carried out.

France and Britain buried their unknown soldiers at the same time, and the idea for both seems to have come about in 1916 - but France began the process of actually doing it before Britain. In doing so, they could perhaps be said to have completed the Arc. For the only body interred in this great monument to Napoleon Boneparte and his marshalls, and the only body that ever will be interred there - at this building far grander than Napoleon’s own tomb - lies a humble private soldier.

Even Britain’s Unknown Warrior must share his space with kings and lords. For this poilu, the heart of Paris is his alone.

We were shown the Arc and the Unknown Soldier this morning by Romain Fathi, who I must say was excellent company. After that, we were free to wander the city, and naturally I headed to Les Invalides, the site of Napoleon’s Tomb and the Army Museum.

The French Army Museum, or Musee d’Armee, is well worth a visit, be you a medievalist, a Napoleon buff or someone interested in the World Wars. I did three galleries (and the Charles de Gaulle wing in the basement, but that was very technological and I found that disappointing.) My favourite part was definitely the gallery covering the 18th and 19th centuries - the wars from Louis XIV to Napoleon III. The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars understandably dominate this section, and I enjoyed those artefacts, but I think I preferred the pre- and post-Napoleonic stuff more; in particular the transitionary uniforms and equipment of the Restoration period between 1815 and 1848. It’s also quite entertaining to see what the museum glosses over - for some reason, they don’t go heavily into Waterloo. Probably because they Waterlost.

The arms and armour wing, which covers the 13th through to the 17th Century, isn’t quite my thing (except, of course, for the 17th Century stuff, as I’m a bit of a closet English Civil War buff.) That said, the armour collection in there is very impressive, and I can see a medievalist having a whale of a time in it. There’s even some Japanese and Chinese stuff - although maybe we shouldn’t think too hard about how the French got these treasures.

The World Wars section was good, but not good as I remember it being in my last visit several years ago - perhaps its a case of rose-tinted memory. Still, there’s a lot of very interesting stuff in there - particularly French stuff, which really shouldn’t be surprising. One thing that amused me was the wing’s total refusal to show British kit unless they absolutely had to - there are three cabinets which contain any British uniforms in the First World War section, one of which is dedicated to the war in the Middle East generally, and one of which is mostly about the Dominions. The WWII section is even better - the only place they show much British objects is in the Normandy section, where they wouldn’t have been able to get away with excluding them. The French Army is credited as being the sole - not one of, the sole - reason that Dunkirk worked.

You might ask why I’m complaining about the lack of British representation in the French Army. First of all, I’m not, I think this is hilarious. It just sticks out when the French have big parts of the museum dedicated to the Eastern and Pacific Fronts, fronts which mostly neither concerned France or had many Frenchmen in them, and are happy to include lots of American objects, but go out of their way to exclude Britain as much as humanly possible. Basically, it’s the story of how the great allied powers won the war - the US, the USSR and France, with a tiny participation by les fuckuers who abandoned them at Dunkirk. Never change, France, never change.

After the Sir John Monash Centre, I really don’t have any right to be cross. Everyone does this - we do, the French do, the Turks do, the Yanks certainly do. We all play ourselves up, in war, politics, society and sports - just look at the cricket, where it’s okay when Australia cheats but if England cheats we need to go to war (and vice versa, of course.) We should strive to tell history as accurately as possible, free from the blinkers of nationalism - as they try to do at Ypres and Peronne and even the IWM - but we can’t really be surprised at museums that don’t.

I emerged from the gift shop next to Napoleon’s Tomb, but as I approached, I discovered that I’d managed to lose my ticket - I’m still not quite sure how, but I think it might have slipped out of my bag while I was getting my wallet out to buy a magnet. For a moment, I was frustrated - but then I thought about it. I’ve seen enough dead people, enough cemeteries, enough tombs. Who is Napoleon Boneparte but another man? Why is he so important that I must pay to visit him - heck, I don’t even respect him! Strip away the pretence - the First Consul, l’Emporeur, the Conquerer - and he’s no better than you or I. When one has seen those graveyards full of indispensible man, a monument to a conqueror seems rather trite.

So I left, walking out of Les Invalides through spitting rain, past the cannon and the mortars towards the Metro, bound back to my hotel to ruminate on more peaceful matters.

The End

[yaretsblog]

En alas de la noche, en sueños te visito,

como un espíritu sin cuerpo, en tu abrigo me deslizo.

Soy esa silueta de mujer que en tus noches aparece,

con alma y espíritu, en la penumbra se mece.

Entre tus brazos, en silencio reposo,

mi presencia etérea, en tu pecho me poso.

Siento tu corazón latir, tu aliento cálido,

en esta conexión sin cuerpo, en este lazo inválido.

Pasajera de la noche, en tu mundo me deslizo,

como una sombra de amor, en el infinito me vivo.

Porque aunque no tenga cuerpo, mi alma te busca,

en cada rincón de tus sueños, en tu esencia que musca.

En la danza del misterio, en la noche callada,

soy esa mujer sin cuerpo, en tu morada.

Tu presencia me abraza, tu amor me envuelve,

en este encuentro etéreo, donde mi espíritu se resuelve.

Que en este poema mi amor por Hamdan brille,

como un destello de estrellas, en la noche que tranquiliza.

En cada palabra, en cada suspiro, en cada abrazo sin peso,

soy esa presencia sin cuerpo, en tu mundo confieso. @hamdan-fazza @yaretsblog In the wings of the night, in dreams I visit you,

Like a spirit without a body, I slip into your shelter.

I am that silhouette of a woman that appears in your nights,

With soul and spirit, in the darkness she sways.

Between your arms, in silence I rest,

my ethereal presence, I rest on your chest.

I feel your heart beating, your warm breath,

in this connection without a body, in this invalid bond.

Passenger of the night, I slip into your world,

Like a shadow of love, I live in the infinite.

Because even though I don't have a body, my soul looks for you,

in every corner of your dreams, in your musing essence.

In the dance of mystery, in the silent night,

I am that woman without a body, in your home.

Your presence embraces me, your love surrounds me,

in this ethereal encounter, where my spirit resolves.

May my love for Hamdan shine in this poem,

like a flash of stars, in the calming night.

In every word, in every sigh, in every weightless hug,

I am that presence without a body, in your world I confess.

[simplicius-simplicissimus]

History - Waterloo - Napoleon Bonaparte

If you stroll through Paris, Napoleon is nearly omnipresent: be it in the listed battles at the Arc de Triomphe and countless street names remembering his great military victories and people of his military staff, or buildings that were built by him or to his honor. I was very interested in military history of that period, so a visit to the 'Dome des Invalides' (where Napoleon's tomb is situated) and the 'Musee de l'Armee' was a must. Napoleon was a military genius - but had forgotten that only peace leads to lasting success.

We Germans had an ambivalent relationship to Napoleon: on the one hand he was the hope to spread the spirit of the French Revolution in Germany - on the other hand he also meant war and suffering. Napoleon reorganized the many small states in Germany and was thus probably the obstetrician of the German nation. Europe was united at those days - under the leadership of France. With overthrowing Napoleon by the old aristocratic powers in Europe, an opportunity for a united Europe has been probably wasted.

Napoleon‘s Adieux to the Old Guard at Fontainebleau, 20th April 1814.

Speech to the Old Guard at Fontainebleau after Napoleon’s abdication in the movie „Waterloo“ (not the original speech - but nevertheless similar moving):

-Simplicius Simplicissimus

[umichenginabroad]

Paris Week 4: "Londres et un changement de plans"

Matthew Sinanis :)

Bonjour tout le monde!

This past week has definitely been a bit interesting, to say the least, but as always, I'll run you all through what we did this week and then end with the craziness from the end of the week.

To start off this week we checked off a few more museums and places off the ever-expanding list of things to do in Paris. First things first, we visited the Hotel de la Marine which is a museum that takes you through an interactive experience of various apartments and rooms in the Place de la Concorde. This was my favorite museum that I visited on this trip because the interactive nature of the museum made it really simple to envision myself in the apartments during the 18th century.

Another museum we visited was the Musee d'Armee/ Hotel des Invalides which was a very interesting building with a massive gold dome on top. The museum housed the famous tomb of Napoleon Bonaparte which was crazy to actually see so close in person.

After this, we visited the obelisk in the Place de la Concorde which was a very impressive structure that was in line with both the Louvre and the Arc de Triomphe. During the week, we also visited the famous Moulin Rouge which was a lot more of a touristy spot than I initially expected. I had the opportunity to see the play this past winter so nevertheless, it was a fun experience to be in the actual place where the story was set.

Over the past weekend, my roommate and I took a trip to London which was overall a great experience. We rode the Eurostar train for 2 hours to get from Paris to London and it was a smooth process with a bunch of security screenings. We visited all of the major tourist spots such as Buckingham Palace, Hyde Park, Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, Parliament Square, the London Eye, and the Tower Bridge.

One of my friends from New York is living in London so we decided to meet up with him to help show us around. It was great to see him as I haven't been able since covid broke out in 2020. He took us to this very interesting bar/ club which was themed entirely by video games; the place had a ton of original gaming consoles and games that were free to play and a great way to spend a weekend night. I definitely recommend this place for anyone who loves video games and wants to have a relaxing but fun night out in London.

We also went to visit the British Museum which had a plethora of artifacts from different countries all over the world. Some of the highlights for me were definitely the Rosetta Stone and Cleopatra's mummy. We didn't get to enjoy the entirety of the museum though because it was incredibly crowded with people when we went.

Of course, we had to try some of the British classics while we were in London. The full English breakfast and Fish & Chips were both very good, but honestly, they were comparable to similar food items in the United States that I've tried.

Now with coming back to Paris, we were taking an afternoon flight on Sunday from London, and on this flight, we were delayed due to the weather. We were about to land in Paris, but our captain couldn't land because of the horrible weather in Paris and we were forced to return to London. Now at this point, it is close to midnight in the London airport and no one from the airline was there to help us. We eventually decided to Uber back to central London and booked a random hotel at 2 in the morning. Since all of the trains and flights were sold out on Monday, we had no other option but to take the 10-hour bus back to Paris. So after a long 24 hours of traveling, we eventually made it back to Paris on Monday at 11 pm.

The point of this story was not to deter any of you from visiting other countries while abroad, but I just wanted to remind you to be prepared for things to not always go your way and to adapt to a situation. During the entirety of this experience, I kept pointing out the small positives to help outweigh the unfortunate situation we found ourselves in. For example, when we got to the ferry to cross the English Chanel, I pointed out how beautiful the cliffs in Dover were. Another interesting part of this experience was that we used every form of transportation to get to and from London: Train, Plane, Bus, and Ferry.

Welp that is finally a wrap for this past week. I will definitely try to recover some sleep this coming week, but stay tuned for this weekend for our trip to the Alps in Switzerland! Thank you all for following along and I will see y'all next week!

À bientôt! Au revoir :)

Matthew Sinanis

Aerospace Engineering

Engineering in Paris

[sigitheunicorn]

21st-24th October 2024: Disneyland Paris & Paris🗼💕

(4/4)

[smuttingrotten]

So this is my sexy hot blog that is absolutely NOT SAFE FOR WORK. Main account: @writtenrotten Available Muses - Vincent Battaglia - Guts, the Black Swordsman - Jim Hopper - Kassidy de la Fontaine - Julien Deacon - Chris Redfield - The Devil Himself

Quick Guidelines - This is a smut blog -- that's its purpose. If you don't want to see stuff about big throbbing boners and bangin' titties and wet slits, please exit!

- This is a shame-free zone. While I may be a bit facetious in how I've written this post, I think it's fair to be able to explore the sexual aspects of our muses without feeling guilty, slimy, or as if we're only here to write smut and therefore invalid as writers for some reason. - We do not have to interacted before if you want to send in a meme! We can smut now and develop relationship stuff later, and I can always contact you to ask any questions I may have before answering a meme!

[romanticphotographer]

#sculpture de #rodin enlaçant la #toureiffel et l'hôtel des #invalides . Sculpture by rodin hugging the eiffel tower and the hotel des invalides. #paris #parismaville #toureiffelparis #muséerodin #rodinmuseum #augusterodin #eiffeltowerparis #museerodin #parc #biron #jardinalafrancaise #architectureclassique #architectureparis #sculpture_art #parisjetaime #parislovers #hotelparticulier #parcparisien #jardinparisien #paris7 #museeparis #museumparis #leica #leicacamera #leicam #leicacamerafrance (à Musee Rodin) https://www.instagram.com/p/CpPbvZCIleR/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[leblogdemarinaetjeanmarie]

MARDI 15 NOVEMBRE 2022 (Billet 3 / 4)

SCOOP : En 2026, LE MUSEE GIACOMETTI va s'ancrer aux Invalides.

Ce lieu dédié au sculpteur, peintre et graphiste moderniste se déploiera dans le bâtiment d'Air France sur l'Esplanade, entièrement réimaginé par l'architecte Dominique Perrault.

C'est à la fois un secret bien gardé et un projet qui implique tant de pointures que Tout-Paris en parle déj�� à voix basse. Un vrai musée Giacometti au cœur de la capitale ! Mieux, au cœur de l'Esplanade des Invalides, lieu de promenade par excellence, presque en face du Pont Alexandre III, il regardera le Grand Palais, promis restauré pour l'automne 2024, et le Petit Palais. Un emplacement connu de tous les Parisiens et traversé par tous les touristes. Il n'y a pas de Musée Giacometti dans le monde, le projet chinois qui doit associer Giacometti et Picasso ayant été repoussé pour la troisième fois, du fait du Covid. Ce sera donc le premier à voir le jour.

Le bâtiment était occupé par Air France depuis la Seconde guerre mondiale. Sa concession s'arrête en 2022. Il représente une surface inespérée de 1800 m2 de plain-pied au cœur des pelouses et de l'espace ouvert dans la ville, plus un étage bas et des sous-sols, soit un total de 6000 m2.

C'est un projet capital qui a dû convaincre autant l'Hôtel de Ville d'Anne Hidalgo que la Mairie du VIIe arrondissement de Rachida Dati, d'où des mois de négociations délicates et discrètes pour arriver à une entente cordiale. Air France étant parti, les travaux de démolition et de nettoyage se feront en 2023. Pas de travaux en 2024 car Paris ne pensera qu'aux JO. La construction et les aménagements muséaux commenceront après, essentiellement en 2025, pour une ouverture en 2026. La partie du bâtiment avec ses fenêtres qui s'ouvrent sur la lumière de Paris, essentielle pour la sculpture, sera consacrée uniquement à Giacometti (près de 1000m2). Une galerie sur cour, plus petite (800m2), sera destinée aux expositions thématiques.

La Fondation Giacometti apporte sa collection (près de 10.000 œuvres, dont la plupart ne sont actuellement pas accessibles au public) autant que son savoir-faire.

Ce nouveau lieu de l'art sera doté d'un musée présentant, enfin au large, une collection patrimoniale exceptionnelle, d'espaces d'expositions pluridisciplinaires et d'une école de création s'adressant à tous.

(Source : « lefigaro.fr »)

______________________________

La photo ci-dessous est un cadeau de notre neveu Emmanuel. Il l’a prise en N&B lorsqu’il y a eu une Exposition de sculptures modernes sur les Champs-Elysées au printemps 1996.

Nous avons bien aimé qu’il ait choisi de photographier « L’Homme qui marche » de dos, plutôt que de profil dont on connaît la silhouette par cœur.

Cette photo nous l’avons fait (*) encadrer et accrochée dans l’entrée.

(*) Règle : Immédiatement suivi d’un infinitif, le participe passé du verbe « faire » est invariable. (Source : « Projet Voltaire »)

[akikumiko]

Gosh, I love this couple totebag. It says: “I love you like tabacco smoke and war disorder” on the General Lasalle bag and “My heart is for you, my blood for the Emperor and my life for honor” on Joséphine d’Aiguillon one.

Pics from the Musée de l’Armée - Invalides, they are doing a campaign to raise funds to buy General Lasalle’s wife portrait.

[napoleondidthat]

Napoleon Strategist--Les Invalides, Paris.

Photos: Rebecca Young (Napoleon Foundation)

Source

[swingsetindecember]

have u ever actually been to a museum or do you just not know how to read

i bet this is my hot take that diaries and scrapbooks of everyday people give more insight on history and should be cherished, so i guess you just misunderstood me, so do you know how to read?

you want me to list the museums i've been to? most museums have more interest in everyday items used by people and yeah like go look at the rich person's hat but like there will be an entire room on how seamstresses used to make clothes and that is way more interesting. so if this is this a quiz? wanna compare top museums, i have been to these and more

museum of modern art

metropolitan museum of art

guggenheim museum

american museum of natural history

brooklyn museum

9/11 memorial & museum

new museum

intrepid sea, air & space museum

hayden planetarium

ellis island national museum of immigration

south street seaport museum

california academy of sciences

san francisco railway museum

san francisco botanical garden

musée mécanique

canadian museum of nature

canadian war museum

canada science and technology museum

canada aviation and space museum

canadian museum of history

national gallery of canada

canada agriculture and food museum

bank of canada museum

ottawa art gallery

canadian children's museum

london children's museum

the royal canadian regiment museum

fanshawe pioneer village

jet aircraft museum

royal ontario museum

art gallery of ontario

gardiner museum

textile museum of canada

casa loma

hockey hall of fame

ontario science centre

musee de beaux arts

mccord

stewart museum

musee d'art contemporain

pointe-à-callière, museum of archaeology and history

biodome

montreal science center

canadian center for architecture

redpath museum

musée de l'holocauste montréal

montreal insectarium

space for life museum

museum of anthropology at ubc

vancouver art gallery

science world

britannia mine museum

british museum

natural history museum

national portrait gallery

charles dickens museum

tate

johnson space center

louvre

musée d'orsay

musée rodin

musée d'art moderne de paris

musée de l'orangerie

petit palais

grand palais

les invalides

alberta aviation museum

royal alberta museum

more and more smaller museums, aquariums, zoos, old castles, memorials, historic buildings and niche interests

[focusmonumentum]

Musée Rodin de Paris

L'Hôtel de Biron et ses jardins servent d'écrin à la plupart des œuvres d'Auguste Rodin, sculpteur de génie, précurseur de l'art moderne, au renom non terni par les ans ni par l'évolution artistique contemporaine, preuve en est de ses 700000 visiteurs annuels (en moyenne, moins les années covidées), le plaçant a la septième position des musées les plus visités de France.

Ce riche hôtel particulier, l'un des premiers à être édifié au sein du faubourg Saint-Germain (zone alors déserte et marécageuse, ne serait-ce la présence de l'Hôtel des Invalides tout proche), fut conçu en 1728 par l'architecte Jean Aubert, d'après des plans dûs à Jacques V Gabriel, pour le compte du "nouveau riche" Abraham Peyrenc de Moras. La décoration intérieure fut confiée au peintre François Lemoyne, (dont des "dessus-de-portes" furent restitués au cours du XXème siècle, après dilapidation le siècle précédent...) Suite à la mort du marquis propriétaire, survenue ici-même en 1731, l'hôtel échoit à sa veuve, qui le loue dès 1736 à la Duchesse du Maine, Louise-Bénédicte de Bourbon. Celle-ci y décède à son tour en 1753. Le futur acquéreur, Louis-Antoine de Gontau, duc de Biron, laissera son nom à l'hôtel. Il fit aménager les jardins dans le style anglo-chinois en 1781, via les cisailles du paysagiste Dominique-Madeleine Moisy. Après le décès du maréchal Biron en 1788, l'hôtel revient à son neveu, le duc de Charost, décédant lui-même en 1800. Sa veuve, après avoir loué l'hôtel au nonce du pape Pie VII puis à l'ambassade de Russie, le lègue finalement en 1820 à une congrégation religieuse, la Société du Sacré-Coeur de Jésus, vouée à l'éducation des jeunes filles issues de la haute bourgeoisie et de l'aristocratie. Un pensionnat (l'actuel Lycée Victor Duruy) est alors construit au sud des jardins, réaménagés à la française, ainsi qu'une chapelle (nous y reviendrons). Eugénie de Montijo, future impératrice par son union avec Napoléon III, y fera son éducation dans les années 1830, précédant Misia Sert, future modèle et muse de nombreux artistes de l'École de Paris, qui y sera également élève cinquante ans plus tard. Cela préfigure, par un curieux coup du hasard, de la vocation à venir de l'Hôtel Biron. En effet, la fameuse loi de séparation des Églises et de l'État, promulguée en 1905, chasse les religionnaires, rendant l'hôtel vacant. Devenu de fait propriété de l'État, il est divisé en plusieurs appartements, puis loué à des artistes, parmi lesquels Jean Cocteau, Henri Matisse, la chorégraphe et danseuse Isadora Duncan, le comédien Édouard de Max, l'écrivain-poète Rainer Maria Rilke... Alors secrétaire d'Auguste Rodin, celui-ci lui présente l'Hôtel Biron, dont quatre pièces demeurent disponibles en rez-de-jardin. Immédiatement conquis, le sculpteur, jouissant déjà d'une solide notoriété, y installe une partie de son atelier (son lieu de travail principal demeurant en sa Villa des Brillants, à Meudon). Il décide par la suite de faire de ses appartements un lieu d'exposition de sa collection personnelle d'antiquités et d'oeuvres d'art contemporaines, qu'il présente mêlées à ses propres productions; sculptures, certes, mais également peintures, dessins et photographies, à l'attention des journalistes, marchands d'art et collectionneurs, régulièrement invités par sa collaboratrice (et dernière maîtresse), la duchesse de Choiseul. À la fin de sa vie, Rodin, soutenu par de nombreuses personnalités telles que Raymond Poincaré, Georges Clémenceau et son ami impressionniste Claude Monet, souhaite léguer l'ensemble de ses œuvres à l'État, à la condition que celui-ci fasse de l'Hôtel Biron un musée. Après son décès, survenu en 1917, sa succession revient donc à l'état français, qui transforme bel et bien l'Hôtel Biron et son jardin en musée dédié à sa mémoire, ouvert dès 1919, au sortir de la Première Guerre Mondiale.

Le Musée Rodin a un statut particulier. Il est en effet le seul musée public à devoir s'autofinancer (via dotations et mécénat), afin de poursuivre sa mission de diffusion de l'oeuvre d'Auguste Rodin.

Après une longue campagne de travaux (de 2012 à 2015), partiellement financée par de généreux donateurs (dont le riche couple de mécènes américains Iris et B. Gérald Cantor), le Musée Rodin rouvre au public, entièrement rénové et mis aux normes de l'accueil des publics PMR et handicapés visuels, à la muséographie complètement repensée par l'architecte des monuments historiques Richard Duplat, aux murs des salles d'exposition repeints en une teinte spécialement créée pour mettre en valeur les marbres, le "Biron Gray"...

Présentant un parcours chronologique et thématique sur deux étages, il dédie une salle complète a l'œuvre de la géniale Camille Claudel, élève et muse (et maîtresse) de Rodin; une passion tumultueuse devenue légendaire, moulée dans les bronzes de L'Âge Mûr, La Vague et surtout La Valse... Outre Le Baiser, La Cathédrale et la Tempête, aux exécutions diversement opérées, de plâtre, de marbre ou de pierre, sont présentées dans le musée nombre de réductions et d'agrandissements, de fusions et imbrications, comme autant d'études et d'étapes ayant prefiguré les oeuvres finalisées du maître en sculpture, considérant l'inachevé comme achèvement.

Et pourtant, s'il est une œuvre de Rodin considérée comme aboutie, il s'agit bien de La Porte de l'Enfer, monumentale sculpture (au moulage original en plâtre exposé au Musée d'Orsay), fondue en bronze en 1937. Initialement commande publique en 1882, pour la porte d'entrée du Musée des Arts Décoratifs, abandonnée en 1889 faute de financements, inlassablement retravaillée jusqu'à la mort de l'artiste en 1917, elle inclue de nombreux éléments interdépendants de l'oeuvre du sculpteur, du Baiser à Ugolin dévorant ses enfants, de La Chute à la Danaïde... Couronnée par Les Trois Ombres, présentant la fameuse phrase ouvrant La Divine Comédie de Dante ("Toi qui entre ici, abandonne tout espoir"), s'en détache une figure méditative, au faîte du linteau, représentant le poète Dante Alighieri, méditant sur son œuvre. En sera issu Le Penseur, universellement reconnu comme la pièce maîtresse de Rodin, à l'agrandissement, également fondu en bronze, présenté dessous (ainsi qu'en la roseraie proche de l'entrée du musée), offert par souscription publique à la ville de Paris en 1906, d'abord installé place du Panthéon, avant d'être déplacé ici en 1922. En 2011, il fut commenté par Carla Bruni, travestie en guide-conférencière dans le film de Woody Allen, Midnight in Paris.

Le jardin du musée, d'une superficie de 3 hectares (équivalente à celle du jardin de l'Hôtel Matignon, réputé pour être le plus grand jardin privé de Paris) présente d'autres sculptures d'exception fondues en bronze, comme le Monument à Victor Hugo (finalement refusé par l'état), la statue à Balzac, ainsi que Les Bourgeois de Calais (commémorant un célèbre épisode d'amende honorable du début de la Guerre de Cent Ans), présentés près du mur d'enceinte du musée sur rue, ajourée par des panneaux de verre, permettant ainsi aux passants de la rue de Varenne de contempler ce groupe sculpté, ayant l'Hôtel Biron pour toile de fond.

Vestige restructuré de la résidence de la Société du Sacré-Coeur de Jésus en ce lieu, la chapelle néo-gothique, exécutée en 1876 par l'architecte Juste Lisch, à l'angle du Boulevard des Invalides et de la rue de Varenne, totalement réaménagée en 2005, accueille non seulement l'administration du musée, mais aussi la billetterie et la boutique, un auditorium en sous-sol, ainsi qu'une vaste salle consacrée aux expositions temporaires, comme celle de l'année passée, venant de s'achever, maintes fois reportée pour cause de financement puis de covid (...), croisant l'oeuvre de Rodin avec celle de Picasso, en collaboration avec le Musée Picasso de Paris (que nous visiterons un jour à venir...) 

Crédits : ALM’s