III. To exhibit differently an impressive collection.

What remains the most impressive with this Museum, it is its way to expose its collection and to offer a new meaning with the presentation of its objects. And here is its real originality and its modernity.

(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffJPQn_6ink)

What the museum could have been...

 1) The Time Gallery.

On 400 feet in length, from the birth of writing to 3,500 BC until the middle of the 19th century, all civilization and techniques are represented, embracing the extent chronological and geographical collections of the Louvre. The Time gallery is organised into 3 main periods: 70 works for the Antiquity, 45 works for the Middle ages and 90 works for Modern times.

A comparison between two
masterpieces.

Unlike other museums, the Louvre-Lens do not possesses its own collections. The Time gallery exposes, during 5 years, masterpieces from the Louvre museum.  A little less than 20% of them will be renewed at the end of a year, on the anniversary of the opening of the Museum on 4th December, then regularly every year. This rotation will retain a regular audience who will be able to discover each year a renewed exhibition.

The other principle of the Time gallery is to present every single object for itself to the visitors, that is the reason why, you have a wall for each piece : in the Time gallery, the intrinsic quality of each work is brought into relief. But this presentation is also allowing the public to move from one room to another and to enjoy them all. Here is the main difference between the Louvre Lens and other types of museums. 

The Time gallery without works of art.

The bias in favor of a unique exhibition room is a chance to link different works produced by different cultures and civilizations, but created during the same historical moment. Contrary to the Louvre museum, with its architectural limits, where the presentation of the collections by Department imposes an exhibition by artistic movement. On the contrary, the Louvre-Lens gives us another approach. The public can, for example, see masterpieces of the classical Greece face to those of the Persian Empire or those of Pharaonic Egypt. It is a new understanding of the History of art and humanity, which is possible here.

The Museum wishes to show differently its collection and it makes possible a new reflexion field for the public, through the choice of a single exhibition room, where art of works are confronted to new comparisons : a new explanation of the historical masterpieces is possible. But, is it really new? If we want to go furthermore, we can say that such exhibitions were more usual during the 19th centuries.

2) The Glass pavilion.

        Enlightened due to large glass panels, the Glass Pavilion is divided into three interior spaces all closed. For a period of five years, the subject presented is the history of the time. "Time at work” tackles the cycle of the seasons, day, night, and calendars, but also the linear time based on human life, the life of the world. Each year, a new theme will be developed to complete and extend the Time gallery in a pedagogical and didactic approach.

A cocoon of the Glass pavilion.

The common theme seems to be hard to apprehend but the designer had been able to make the subject accessible to everyone by playing on a rhythmical course of three huge bubbles of plaster that create the effect of surprise. The visitor is invited to enter in these cocoons that serve to create an atmosphere of calm and quiet.

Then, we can say that this exhibition space is very entertaining, because the public can easily participate : for example, there are in the Glass pavilion, video to watch and listen with explanations on the subject that the exhibition deals with. There is also a contemporary work of art that gives us a personal experience of time through the transcript of the heartbeat in a comic or philosophical message.

A contemporary work of art.

However, there again, we did not notice extravagances in the presentation of works of art. The walls and the floor are always white. We feel this desire of continuity in the building and the habits of the Louvre museum to create something homogenous without taking any risks, or offer to the public new devices.

Is it really a contemporary museum? A priori, it seems modern, with comfortable rooms and in accordance with current ideas in the museums world. Nevertheless, it reminds that it is an extension of the Louvre which keeps its habits without honestly innovate. Perhaps, is this finally a museum that revives and improves the old used in the 19^th century? 

3) The temporary exhibition.

          
        Each year, two temporary exhibitions will be presented in relation with the themes choosen for the Parisien Louvre and the Nord-Pas-de-Calais museums. They will be designed in the aim of alternating exhibitions involving perspective a time or a place or crosscutting themes in the history of art. The temporary exhibition is currently focused on the Renaissance. The museum reaches to introduce a revolutionary period in the world of art through 14 different topics.

The skeleton.

There is also a section on the furniture and the inspirations of the Renaissance. In this part, as in the other parts of the exhibition, the room remains simple, but however, there is the presence of a reproduction of a room decorated according to the tastes of the people who lived during the Renaissance. It deals with what were doing in museums such as the Museum of French Monuments of Alexandre Lenoir after the French Revolution. We appreciate this contextualization which is not original but useful for visitors who have not knowledge on this period.

This exhibition is on a traditional topic, but what is significant here is that there is a presentation that goes furthermore and which isn’t limited it to the usual masterpieces such as paintings of Leonardo da Vinci or Michelangelo. Of course, there are “classical” works of arts as “Saint Anne, the Virgin and the child playing with a lamb”, but this exhibition exceeds the clichés and gives us a section on the body that requires attention of the public. In this part of the exhibition, there are books opened with many prints, or even a sculpture that represents a skeleton.

The reproduction of a room.

Finally, unlike the permanent exhibition and the Glass pavilion, the temporary exhibition is situated in rooms with different atmospheres, where the walls may be painted brightly. We can have the impression of being in another museum than the Louvre-Lens’. It is not the same museum that we can regularly see in the newspapers. It is a less modern museum, but perhaps it creates as much emotions as another exhibitions, which turns more to the heart and to the affective taste.

We can't really say that it is a contemporary museum according to the chosen approach of Art and exhiitions, but is it perhaps more pleasant for the visitor to be in a protective bubble or in an environment of contextualization, in order to not to be lost. Again, it is important to remind that this museum want to have a place in the education with pedagogical exhibitions.