TheGrande Galerie (French pronunciation:[ɡʁɑ̃dɡalʁi]), in the past also known as theGalerie du Bord de l'Eau (Waterside Gallery), is a wing of theLouvre Palace, perhaps more properly referred to as theAile de la Grande Galerie (Grand Gallery Wing),[1] since it houses the longest and largest room of the museum, also referred to as the Grande Galerie, one of the museum's most iconic spaces.
This unusually long wing was constructed beginning in 1595 on the initiative of KingHenry IV[2] and was completed in late 1607.[3]: 69 It contained an elevated enclosed passageway linking the oldLouvre Palace with theTuileries Palace. The passageway was used for various purposes until the creation of theLouvre Museum in 1793, when it became the exhibition gallery it remains to this day.[4] Originally 460 meters long, the room was reduced to its current length of 288 meters following the remodeling of its western section in the 1860s in the wake ofNapoleon III's Louvre expansion.[5]
Henry IV directed the building of the gallery, which started in 1595.[2] It may have been inspired by theVasari Corridor inFlorence, designed and built in 1565 byGiorgio Vasari for DukeCosimo I de' Medici, which connects theUffizi with thePalazzo Pitti.[6] The entire wing was completed in 1607.[3]: 69 The gallery is 13 meters wide, and was originally 460 meters long.[7]
The eastern part was built first. The original plans specified the western part would begin after a large pavilion marking the location of thewall of Charles V, but this was changed in 1603, when construction of the western part began at the midpoint between the two ends, thePetite Galerie in the east and thePavillon de Flore in the west. The midpoint was marked with the Pavillon de la Lanterne (today's Pavillon deLesdiguières), which was originally designed to match the south façade of the Petite Galerie at the eastern end. Further west, the location of the moat of Charles V's wall was indicated by a bay widened by two niches.[8]
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The design of the eastern half is traditionally attributed toLouis Métezeau. The ground and intermediate (entresol) floors of the eastern half were soon devoted to artists' dwellings and workshops, by royal authorization in 1608.[9]
The design of the western half is attributed toJacques II Androuet du Cerceau, who decorated it with agiant order ofcoupledpilasters framing two floors of windows. The original design called for theionic order, but this was changed in 1603 to thecomposite order with sculpteddolphins celebrating the 1601 birth of theDauphin, the futureLouis XIII. The dolphin order was also used for Henri IV's additions to the Cour Ovale at thePalace of Fontainebleau.[8]
On the southern side,Jacques Lemercier commissionedNicolas Poussin in 1641 to decorate the ceiling of the Grande Galerie, but Poussin returned to Rome in 1642 leaving the work unfinished.
In 1661, a fire destroyed the Petite Galerie, which linked the Grande Galerie with theCour Carrée, and the adjacent 5-bay pavilion containing theGrand Salon at the eastern end of the Grande Galerie.Louis Le Vau reconstructed the Petite Galerie with theGalerie d'Apollon and theGrand Salon as theSalon Carré, raising the 5-bay pavilion by one storey.[2]: 11-14
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In the 17th century the Grande Galerie was the theater of the "touching" ceremony, four times a year, in which the king was reputed to miraculously cure victimes ofscrofula by simply touching them and pronouncing the ritual words "God heal you, the king touches you" (French:Dieu te guérisse, le roi te touche).[3]: 70
From 1697 on, the French state's collection ofplans-reliefs was stored in the Grande Galerie, of which it occupied all the space by 1754 with about 120 items placed on wooden tables.[2]: 16 This was not intended as an artistic exhibition but served a military purpose, as the plans-reliefs were used to study and prepare defensive and offensive siege operations of the fortified cities and strongholds they represented. The plans-reliefs were removed in 1777 to theHôtel des Invalides, where most of them are still displayed in theMusée des Plans-Reliefs.[10]
During the reign ofLouis XVI, thecomte d’Angiviller promoted the use of the Grande Galerie as a public museum, taskedHubert Robert with preparing it, and had some paintings transferred there from Versailles in 1785. But the gallery was only opened to the public after the start of theFrench Revolution, as theMuséum central des arts opened on 10 August 1793. Together with theSalon Carré it became the core of the Louvre's exhibition spaces, soon enlarged to theGalerie d'Apollon (1797) and the ground-floor summer apartment ofAnne of Austria (1800), and later expanded into the wings around theCour Carrée.
Hubert Robert, after being appointed the museum's first "keeper of paintings",[11] projected to improve the lighting of the gallery, by sealing its windows and openingskylights in its vaulted ceiling.[12] This innovative plan was realized between 1805 and 1810 byPercier and Fontaine, albeit in altered form with lateral skylights at regular intervals. Percier and Fontaine also created nine subdivisions of the long room, separated by groups of columns arranged in the manner ofVenetian windows as Robert had imagined.[5]
On 2 April 1810,Napoleon andMarie Louise of Austria led a procession from the Tuileries throughout the Grande Galerie on the occasion of their wedding, which was celebrated in the Salon Carré, temporarily converted into a chapel.[7]
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In 1849–1851, the exterior façade of the Eastern section of the Grande Galerie was renovated by architectFélix Duban, who replaced most of the stonework even though he scrupulously respected most of the original design. Duban replaced a former passageway, theguichet de la rue des Orties, with a monumental entrance initially calledporte de la Bibliothèque, later renamedporte Barbet de Jouy.[3]: 69
In the 1860s, the Louvre's architectHector-Martin Lefuel remodeled the southwestern wing of the Louvre Palace and created a new venue for state ceremonies, theSalle des Sessions, close to theTuileries Palace where EmperorNapoleon III had his Paris residence. Lefuel cut the Grande Galerie short, reducing it by about a third of its original length, to make space for the new room. Since that room was broader than the gallery, it resulted in a protruding structure on the northern side, thePavillon des Sessions. The building was entirely demolished west of thePavillon Lesdiguières, as was thePavillon de Flore at its western end, and rebuilt to the new plan and new exterior designs that replaced the previousgiant order, which Lefuel disliked, with a replica of Métézeau's façade pattern further east.[13] Lefuel also created the current skylight system at the center of the gallery's ceiling.[7] The new ceilings of the gallery below thePavillon Lesdiguières and Lefuel's newPavillon La Trémoille were adorned with paintings byAlexandre-Dominique Denuelle and stucco sculptures byAlbert-Ernest Carrier-Belleuse.
The interior design was again streamlined around 1950 by Louvre architectJean-Jacques Haffner [fr].[4] in the late 1960s, designerPierre Paulin created new seats for the Grande Galerie.[14] The room was refurbished during the 1990s as part of theGrand Louvre project, with no change of design but installation ofair conditioning and other amenities.[15] In the current arrangement of the Louvre's collections, the Grande Galerie is entirely devoted to the display of Italian paintings.
The Grande Galerie inspired the design of theGalerie des Batailles inVersailles Palace, created underLouis-Philippe I for hisMusée de l'Histoire de France.Pierre Fontaine advised Louis-Philippe's architectFrédéric Nepveu [fr] for that project's zenithal lighting.[16] It also inspired the similar gallery of theMuseo del Prado inMadrid.[citation needed]
Since 2007,Grande Galerie has also been the title of a glossy quarterly magazine published by the Louvre.[17]
