The Louvre

The world's greatest museum takes readers inside its unparalleled art collection to understand the keys to history of art.

The Louvre is a training ground for the eye. With this book, readers will discover more than 400 of its masterpieces from the invention of writing up to the middle of the nineteenth century. The richly illustrated guide, organized chronologically, and with thematic entries (writing, cross-cultural exchange, humanity, power, beauty, the sky, nature), offers the readers the keys inside, to return again at their leisure, for an amazing stroll-in person or virtually-through this world-class museum.

To be used either as a complement to a visit or as a thorough tour of the museum for the armchair reader, this guide is designed to stimulate curiosity by bringing together works from different departments, different regions of the world and different periods in time, in a way that is both universalist and accessible. Far from traditional guides that bring together the notes of a pre-established tour itinerary, the chronological approach renews the discourse and initiates an unprecedented dialogue between the works, which are placed in a global historical and artistic context, bringing out sometimes striking similarities. The Louvre was founded as a way to teach artistic techniques and a mission to educate people on important facets of global cultures. This volume, complete with focus essays, full page images, and full page literary quotes, creates interesting juxtapositions and encourages a more thought filled view of the gallery's masterpieces; a truly didactic guide. Covering early civilizations to the renaissance, to the museum's post-revolution inheritance of religious objects, there are cross references between the works and their historical contexts. The guide truly covers world cultures, celebrating creation and the diversity of the Louvre's collection.

This is an entirely rethought companion for the twenty-first century Louvre visitor by distinguished writer, curator and art historian Dominique de Font-Réaulx. Shown in an easy and practical format, the greatest masterpieces of the museum are presented in an interdisciplinary chronology. It is an invitation to discover (or rediscover) the richness and curiosities of one of the greatest museums in the world.