ATLANTA, GA – In October 2006, the High Museum of Art will launch an unprecedented, three-year partnership with the Musée du Louvre that will bring hundreds of works of art from Paris to Atlanta.  Through the “Louvre Atlanta” partnership, the High will present a series of long-term, thematic exhibitions featuring masterworks from the Louvre’s collections, many of which have never been seen before in the United States.  By Artists Such As Raphael, Poussin, Rembrandt and Velasquez.  Lead patronage for the project has been provided by longtime High Museum Board Member Anne Cox Chambers, who is joined by Accenture as Presenting Partner, and UPS, Turner Broadcasting Corporation, The Coca-Cola Company, Delta Airlines and AXA Art Insurance as Lead Corporate Partners.

The central exhibition of the first year, “Kings as Collectors,” will feature 32 works assembled during the reigns of Kings Louis XIV and Louis XVI, including two very special masterpieces from the Louvre’s collection—Raphael’s “Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione” and Nicolas Poussin’s “Et in Arcadia Ego.”  The exhibition will be on view from October 14, 2006 through September 2, 2007 in the High’s new Anne Cox Chambers Wing, which will be devoted exclusively to “Louvre Atlanta” for the entire three-year partnership.

Two shorter focus exhibitions featuring drawings and decorative items from the royal collections will complement “Kings as Collectors” with consecutive presentations throughout the year.  On view concurrently with “Kings as Collectors” through January 28, 2007, “The King’s Drawings” will bring together approximately 60 works from the Louvre’s extensive holdings to become one of the most significant exhibitions of old master drawings ever mounted in the Southeastern United States.  More than two thirds of these works have never been exhibited in the United States. From March 3, 2007 through September 2, 2007, “Decorative Arts of the Kings” will showcase luxury items manufactured for the Royal Families and their court—none of which, according to the Louvre’s records, have traveled to the United States since they entered the Louvre’s collection. 

“This is an unprecedented opportunity to share many remarkable masterpieces from the Louvre with audiences from throughout the Southeast,” said Michael E. Shapiro, Nancy and Holcombe T. Green, Jr. Director of the High Museum of Art.  “The ‘Louvre Atlanta’ collaboration continues the High’s longstanding strategy of partnering with international institutions to bring the world’s great art to Atlanta.  The project will allow both the Louvre and the High to grow educational initiatives both inside and beyond museum walls, to deepen the visitor experience, and to advance scholarship and professional development.” 

“This is a great opportunity for the Louvre to develop international collaborations with art institutions in new cities like Atlanta,” said Henri Loyrette, President/Director of the Musée du Louvre.  “The High Museum brings a level of national stature and experience to this partnership that will benefit the Louvre.  We have much to learn from one another and look forward to a mutually beneficial exchange of art and ideas.”

“Louvre Atlanta” Year One Exhibitions

Over the course of the three-year partnership, “Louvre Atlanta” will trace the history and development of the Louvre from the 17^th century through the present. The three exhibitions in year one will focus on the genesis of the royal collection of the pre-Revolutionary Régime—the works collected by the Kings before the Louvre was converted from a palace to a museum during the late 18^th century and that make up the heart of the Louvre’s collections.  The central exhibition, “Kings as Collectors,” will be composed primarily of paintings, sculptures and antiquities from the collections of Kings Louis XIV and Louis XVI—the two most important collectors of the 17^th and 18^th centuries.  “Kings as Collectors” will feature paintings by Raphael, Rembrandt, Velázquez, Murillo and Poussin, among others, as well as a group of sculptures that allow for a better understanding of Louis XIV’s dual role as collector and patron.

At the center of the exhibition will be a special presentation of Raphael’s “Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione,” one of the top treasures from the Louvre’s permanent collection.  On view October 14, 2006 through January 28, 2007, the portrait has never left Paris to travel to the United States according to the Louvre’s records.  Admired over the years by art historians and artists alike—including Rembrandt and Rubens who produced their own studies of the painting—Raphael’s portrait of the famous humanist embodies the same ideals of casual grace, or sprezzatura, that Castiglione himself advocated in his famous work, Raphael’s portrait will be replaced by another Louvre treasure, Nicolas Poussin’s “Et in Arcadia Ego.”  Recalling the works of Raphael and the Renaissance masters in subject matter and style, Poussin’s masterpiece is considered to be the defining example of French classicism.

On view through January 28, 2007, the exhibition will showcase masterworks from major early private collections, such as Eberhard Jabach and Pierre-Jean Mariette, which entered the royal collections in the 17^th and 18^th centuries, as well as works by major French artists who served the crown, such as Le Brun, Boel, Mignard and Coypel.  Other featured artists will include Grünwald, Dürer, Rembrandt, Rubens and Watteau.  A highlight of the exhibition is Raphael’s “Head of an Angel,” which was a study for the famous Vatican fresco “The Expulsion of Heliodorus.”

The second focus exhibition of the first year is “Decorative Arts of the Kings,” on view March 3, 2007 through September 2, 2007.  The exhibition will feature decorative arts commissioned for the courts of Kings Louis XIV, Louis XV and Louis XVI, and will explore works that convey the royal and princely tastes for the decorative arts during the last 100 years of the Ancien Régime.  These works also show the dexterity and excellence of the French artisans in the royal factories, which were largely subsidized by Louis XIV and his two successors.  The presentation includes fine examples of furniture, tapestry, ceramics and silver by manufacturers such as Les Gobelins and Sèvres, and artists such as Germain and Auguste, whose influence can still be seen today.

“Louvre Atlanta” Year Two and Three Exhibitions

Year two of “Louvre Atlanta” will consider the Louvre’s collection growth and development during the Napoleonic reign and the Enlightenment, when there was an increased interest in ancient art and archaeology.  The central exhibition will feature masterpieces from the founding cultures of Western civilization and will include works from the Louvre’s Egyptian, Near Eastern and Greco-Roman antiquities departments.

Year two will also include a focus exhibition presenting the work of Jean-Antoine Houdon, whose portraiture included some of the prominent intellectual and political figures of the time, such as Diderot and Voltaire, as well as our founding fathers, George Washington and Benjamin Franklin.  A second focus exhibition will reassemble for the first time an important and influential collection of Greco-Roman and Egyptian antiquities that were installed by the Empress Josephine at Malmaison, her residence located on the outskirts of Paris. 

Year three of “Louvre Atlanta” will consider the Louvre of today and tomorrow.  Exhibitions under development for this year will explore the impact of the Louvre’s collections on the art world today. 

Partnership Support

The total budget for “Louvre Atlanta” is estimated at $18 million.  This includes a $6.4 million payment by the High which will go towards the restoration of the Louvre’s 18^th-century French decorative arts galleries.  The balance of the budget offsets the development of the “Louvre Atlanta” partnership.

To date, the High Museum of Art has raised more than $13 million in support of this project.  Lead patronage for the project has been provided by longtime High Museum Board Member Anne Cox Chambers. For more information about the Musée du Louvre, please visit www.louvre.fr. 

High Museum of Art

The High Museum of Art, founded in 1905 as the Atlanta Art Association, is the leading art museum in the Southeastern United States. With over 11,000 works of art in its permanent collection, the High Museum of Art has an extensive anthology of 19^th- and 20^th-century American art; significant holdings of European paintings and decorative art; a growing collection of African American art; and burgeoning collections of modern and contemporary art, photography and African art.  The High is also dedicated to supporting and collecting works by Southern artists and is distinguished as the only major museum in North America to have a curatorial department specifically devoted to the field of folk and self-taught art.  For more information about the High, please visit www.High.org