Release Date: January 11, 2012
Opening Weekend of Newly Renovated French Galleries is Celebrated with Array of Free Programs Highlighting 19th-Century French Art and Culture at the National Gallery of Art, January 28 and 29, 2012
Film still from French CanCan (Jean Renoir, 1954, DCP from 35 mm, 102 minutes) to be shown on Sunday, January 29, at 5:00 p.m., at the National Gallery of Art in honor of the reopening of the 19th-century French galleries. Image courtesy of Photofest
Washington, DC—The National Gallery of Art will celebrate the reopening of its galleries devoted to 19th-century French impressionist and post-impressionist painting with an array of public programs throughout the opening weekend of January 28–29, 2012, and later. Located on the Main Floor of the West Building, the galleries will reopen to the public on January 28, following a two-year renovation.
All programs are free of charge in the East Building Auditorium unless otherwise noted. Seating is available on a first-come, first-served basis.
Public Symposium
Celebrating the Reopening of the 19th-Century French Galleries
Friday, April 27, 12:00–5:00 p.m., East Building Large Auditorium
Saturday, April 28, 12:00–5:00 p.m., West Building Lecture Hall
Lecture Program
Nineteenth-Century Redux: A New Look at a Great Collection of French Paintings
Sunday, January 29, 2:00 p.m.
Mary Morton, curator and head, department of French paintings, National Gallery of Art
East Building Auditorium
Meet the Curators
Meet the Curators!
Sunday, January 29, 3:00 p.m.
Following the opening day lecture, the French paintings department curators will be in the galleries for a question-and-answer session.
Film Program
New Restoration: French CanCan
Sunday, January 29, 5:00 p.m.
Gaumont's luminous restoration of Jean Renoir's classic tale of the origins of the Moulin Rouge is presented on the occasion of the reopening of the National Gallery's nineteenth-century French painting galleries. With its sensuous color and soft lighting, the Technicolor extravaganza remains an enduring homage to Renoir's father, Auguste, and other artists of the era, especially Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and Edgar Degas. (Jean Renoir, 1954, DCP from 35 mm, 102 minutes)
Concerts
The Singers Companye, Men in Blaque, and Organist Alexander Frey
West Building, East Garden Court
Saturday, January 28 and Sunday, January 29, 1:00–4:00 p.m.
A festival of French music from the 1870s to the 1910s
National Gallery of Art Vocal Ensemble
West Building, West Garden Court
Sunday, January 29, 6:30 p.m.
Music by Fauré and other French composers
Pascal and Ami Rogé, duo-pianists
West Building, West Garden Court
Sunday, March 4, 6:30 pm
Music by Debussy
Gallery Talks
Reimagining Courbet in the Reopened French Galleries
Adam Davies
February 2 and 3, 12:00 p.m.
February 10–12, 1:00 p.m.
West Building Rotunda
50 minutes
Nineteenth-Century French Painting
Elizabeth Tunick
February 6, 7, 9, and 10, 11:00 a.m.
West Building Rotunda
40 minutes
"New" French Galleries
Sally Shelburne
March 15 and 22, 1:00 p.m.
April 24 and 28 at 1:00 p.m.
West Building Rotunda
60 minutes
Renoir in Paris
Eric Denker
May 1, 2, 3, 9, 22, 11:00 a.m.
West Building Rotunda
30 minutes
Gallery Shops
A variety of offerings inspired by the Gallery's great works of French art will be available in the shops, including three newly designed mugs printed with works from the permanent collection, as well as posters, bookmarks, note cards and puzzles. A 2013 impressionism wall calendar will be available in May, featuring works from the Gallery's collection. One of Claude Monet's masterpieces, The Artist's Garden at Vétheuil (1880), will be reproduced on canvas using high-density, pigmented inks.
About the Installation
The Gallery's collection of later 19th-century French paintings—among the greatest in the world of works by Manet, Monet, Renoir, Cézanne, Van Gogh, and Gauguin—will return to public view in a freshly conceived installation design. While the appearance of these revered rooms on the Main Floor of the West Building will have changed very little—preserving the conditions of light, the room proportions, and wall colors that make the Gallery one of the great places to view art in the world—the paintings themselves will be shown in dynamic new arrangements organized into thematic, monographic, and art historical groupings.
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