Musée d'Orsay

The Musée d'Orsay is housed in a former railway station, Gare d'Orsay, situated beside the Seine River in Paris. Originally built for the Chemin de Fer de Paris à Orléans, the station was designed by Lucien Magne, Émile Bénard, and Victor Laloux and completed in time for the 1900 Exposition Universelle. However, the design was considered an "anachronism" as it drew inspiration from the past rather than embodying the modern traits of train travel, which was a new innovation at the time. The station was used as the terminus for railways of southwestern France until 1939 when it became unsuitable for longer trains. After that, it was used for suburban services, a mailing center during World War II, and a film set.

In the 1970s, work began to build a tunnel under the station for the creation of line C of the Réseau Express Régional, with a new station under the old one. In 1970, plans were made to demolish the station, but it was put on the supplementary list of Historic Monuments and finally listed in 1978. The Directorate of the Museum of France suggested turning the station into a museum to bridge the gap between the Louvre and the National Museum of Modern Art at the Georges Pompidou Centre. The plan was accepted by Georges Pompidou, and ACT Architecture was awarded the contract to create 20,000 square metres of new floorspace on four floors, with construction carried out by Bouygues.

In 1981, Italian architect Gae Aulenti was chosen to design the museum's interior, including the internal arrangement, decoration, furniture, and fittings. She created elaborate galleries on the three main levels under the museum's barrel vault atrium. The central nave's structures broke up the immense sculpture and gallery spaces and provided more organized units for viewing the art. The museum officially opened in December 1986, and since then, about 3,000 art pieces have been on display at any given time.

One of the most popular attractions within the museum is a 1:100 scale model created by Richard Peduzzi of an aerial view of Paris Opera and the surrounding area encapsulated underneath glass flooring that viewers walk on as they proceed through the museum. Another exhibit is "A Passion for France: The Marlene and Spencer Hays Collection," which was donated by the Hays, who have been collecting art since the early 1970s. The collection features mostly post-impressionist works by artists such as Bonnard, Vuillard, and Edgar Degas, among others.

To make room for the donated art, the Musée d’Orsay is undergoing a radical transformation from 2020 to 2026, funded in part by an anonymous US patron who donated €20 million to a building project known as Orsay Grand Ouvert. The renovation will create new galleries and education opportunities to provide a more conducive experience.

During the 19th century, sculpture was highly sought after and often used to demonstrate a person's social and political status. However, by the mid-20th century, the styles and ideologies represented by many sculptures fell out of favor, leading to their storage and removal from display. In the 1970s, the conversion of Orsay railway station into the Musée d'Orsay provided a new home for many 19th-century sculptures, with over 1,200 pieces displayed during the museum's grand opening in 1986. These sculptures came from collections such as the Louvre, state loans, and Musée du Luxembourg, and the museum has since acquired additional works through donations and purchases.

Today, the Musée d'Orsay houses more than 2,200 sculptures by major artists such as Alfred Barye, François Rude, Jules Cavelier, Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux, Émile-Coriolan Guillemin, Auguste Rodin, Paul Gauguin, Camille Claudel, Sarah Bernhardt, Aristide Maillol, and Honoré Daumier. To fill gaps and complete existing collections, the museum has acquired specific works, including panels from Paul Gauguin's Be Mysterious, the full set of Honoré Daumier's Célébrités du Juste Milieu, and Maturity by Camille Claudel. Additionally, the museum has collected works from other institutions and museums, such as Louis-Ernest Barrias' Nature Unveiling Herself Before Science, originally commissioned for Conservatoire des Arts et Métiers, and Auguste Rodin's The Thinker and The Gates of Hell.