Paris is a museum town, and my unofficial number is almost 150. Beyond the state-owned Grand Demes, the Louvre, Musee d'Orcey, Versailles (if you define a palace as a museum) – a free urban museum (including Petit Palais and Carna Valletto), a museum dedicated to one artist (Rodin, Picasso), one artist (Balzac, George Sand), one smoking by one).
However, some of the most interesting collections may be those you've never heard of and isolated in hidden spaces. There are three museum spaces that many Parisians have never heard of.
Hiding at the far end of the vast Louvre is an intimate, small, visited wing. The consulting room in the Graphic Arts department faces Karsel's garden with an entrance guarded by two stone lions. There you will be able to see the works of the world's most famous artists as long as you wish.
The Louvre does not advertise how to visit the consultation room. The department has almost 150,000 drawings, pastels, miniatures, prints, engraved plates, rare books, signs, woodblock prints, lithographic stones and manuscripts.
A visit requires patience. You must submit a reservation for the names and numbers of up to 10 portfolios in French through the Louvre website from the museum's online catalogue. We then wait for written acceptance, usually sent within a few days.
You can bring your notebook, laptop, camera, or mobile phone with you, but other items must be kept in your locker. Pencils without erasers are provided. If you want to look into miniatures on rare albums or wood, you will be given a latex gloves.
The consultation room looks more like a magnificent library than a gallery. Four arched bass reliefs carved on the walls tell the story of the triumph of flora, the ancient Roman goddess of flowers, gardens and fertility. The oval ceiling painting by Alexandre Kabanel celebrates Flora's Spring Victory Festival. Light comes from a 10-foot-high stained glass window facing the Seine.
Sitting on a leather-covered table illuminated by a lamp in a green glass tint. Staff pull out one of the black file boxes stored in locked cases lined up in the room, revealing a frameless drawing matted in heavy cardboard, removing the selection, and sending a path to the stand on top of the table.
One day I had him take a look at some of the works of Eugène Delacroix. I chose 10 drawings and sketches in watercolor and Penrick, and was presented with several works showing stairs and tents, including Delacroix's “Tangier Courtyard.” Another featured six muscular nude women. Brown and yellow spots were caused long ago by mold spores marked on paper.
During another visit I saw the leather volume of Albrecht Duller, the passion and death of Christ. The book was laid out in red felt, with a white pillow supporting my spine.
“You don't need to be an art historian or professor to come here,” a Louvre official whispered to me. “You need to be a serious art lover. We welcome the world!”
Graphic Arts Division, Flower Wing, Porto de Lions Entrance, 1st floor, Monday to Friday, 1:30pm to 6pm only. Free entry.
At 59, Avenue Fock, historically one of Paris' most prestigious streets, is a 19th-century neoclassical mansion that has remained largely untouched for 150 years. The parquet flooring at points in Hungary is creaking. Fragile windows should be opened with caution. The heat rarely turns on during the winter.
The mansion is packed with over 8,000 Chinese and Japanese objects from the collection of Clemens Dennily, a ferocious collector of Asian art. Muséed by the state-owned Musée Guimet since 1908, Muséed'Ennery has resumed turning on and off small groups for several hours a week since 2011. You must register online to visit.
Born into a wealthy family in 1823, Danny had a free spirit. While legally separated from her first husband, she became the spouse of playwright and novelist Adolf Philippe de Ennary, and eventually married him.
Clémence D'Ennery will not step into Asia. Instead, she acquired her object through dozens of dealers in France. As her collection grew, she used her money to build a mansion near Bois des Boulogne. It has become an important salon in Paris. There, actors, writers, politicians and artists came by carriages to meet and see her collection.
“She collected anything she liked,” said Véronique Crombé, an art historian and guide. “She didn't pretend to be an expert.”
Without children, Danny produced her home and collection as a public museum, as long as everything was intact. Her portrait cannot survive.
Thanks to a partial restoration several years ago, the grand, second-floor “curiosity cabinet” shines like the Label Epoch era. Three galleries with soaring ceilings, marble pillars and crystal chandeliers have cases packed with objects. A mask inspired by lacquer boxes, enamel porcelain, carved gemstones, chimera-known fantastic Chinese creatures, No Theatre (a form of traditional Japanese dance drama).
One gallery is considered to be the world's largest public display of Japan's roots. Approximately 2,500 miniature decorative counterweights, carved from materials such as ivory, wood, and porcelain, are traditionally hung on kimono belts.
“It costs 15 million euros to bring the building back into shape, which is clearly a total we don't have,” King's director Yannick Linz told reporters during his visit. She said she is actively raising funds and dreams of a restored museum in her own tea house.
Muséed'Ennery at 59 Avenue Foch is taking a guided tour on Saturdays. Entry is 9 euros, or about $10.25. Reservations only.
An engineering museum?
Since 1794, the mineral collection has been part of the Elite Engineering and Mining University, Paris, or PSL (Paris Mine) near the Luxembourg Gardens. The Hungarian oak display case at the Grand Gallery has remained unchanged since the mid-19th century.
The museum displays over 1,200 mineral species, making it the fourth-largest collection of its type. Rainbow rocks, metstones, ores and gems fill the room. “Even the Smithsonians don't display as many mineral species as we do,” said director Elois Geirou.
For over two centuries, museums have searched the world for treasure. They were confiscated from the collections of royals, nobles and clergy during the French Revolution, but they were purchased, exchanged and donated. Currently there are over 100,000 objects. There are 5,000 on display. The rest is packed into drawers and cupboards.
“Our museums are better known by mineral collectors, geologists and nerds around the world than tourists,” Geirow said.
For her, the Mona Lisa in the collection is a Mexican volcanic root rock with precious opal blue, red and green nodules.
For Americans, the superstar is a blue cap, a pink red tourmaline with a blue head from the Tourmaline Eene mine in California's Para Mining District.
For the French, it could be a large hopper caprite crystal covered in malachite from Chessy Le Mines in the Rhône division.
Another rarity is the large octahedral diamonds installed in volcanic rocks in South Africa.
There are also samples of Mars and the moon, fluorescent minerals that shine under ultraviolet rays, and flashy opals of pink, green, red, blue and purple.
There are 60 metstones on display, including the famous Allendechondrites, which include some of the oldest particles in the solar system. And a 500-pound fragment of Canyon Diablo Met stone that fell into what is now Arizona about 50,000 years ago.
And jewelry enthusiasts discover a selection from a collection of around 1,200 cut gemstones (200 on display), including those that were once part of the French crown.
The museum “tells a wonderful story of exploration, discovery, invention and conflict,” said one of its guidebooks. “Let's get hooked on what the stone has to say.”
Muséede Minéralogie, Paris, PSL, 60 Boulevard St.-Michel, open Tuesday to Saturday (opening hours vary). The entrance is 7 euros.
