Fall Museum Shows in Paris

Man Ray Pablo Picasso Titian Henri Matisse Pierre-Auguste Renoir Antonin Artaud Andre Breton Claude Cahun

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We’ve selected a handful of the best, from a range of disciplines — film, Old Master painting, photography, archaeology, sculpture, 20th-century painting — and just as many countries. This season’s blockbuster show, which looks set to record spectacular attendance figures (if the two-and-a-half-hour wait to get into the "private" opening is anything to go by), is "Titian, Tintoretto, Veronese: Rivals in Renaissance Venice" at the Louvre. (We reported on it earlier this year when it showed in Boston, but see it again in Paris through Jan. 4, 2010.) If you’re allergic to long lines, try one of the other top-notch shows on offer.

Click on the image at left for a slide show of works from the recommended shows.

"The Subversion of Images. Surrealism, Photography and Film," at Centre Georges-Pompidou, Sept. 23, 2009–Jan. 11, 2010

"Beauty will be CONVULSIVE or will not be at all," declared Surrealist leader André Breton in his 1928 novel Nadja. This exhibition traces the convulsions set off by the Surrealists in the realm of photography, which revolutionized the way we look at the world and still influence magazines and advertising today. Arranged thematically — with rooms devoted to photomontage, the use of automatism, and the Surrealist view of the city, among other concerns — the show presents nearly 400 works by such artists as Man Ray, Claude Cahun, Maurice Tabard, Paul Eluard, Antonin Artaud, and Raoul Ubac, to name just a few. The Pompidou is also organizing, on the eve of his 90th birthday, a retrospective exhibition of works by Pierre Soulages (Oct. 14, 2009–March 8, 2010), an artist the curators describe as “the greatest painter of the contemporary French scene.”

"Teotihuacan, City of the Gods," Musée du Quai-Branly, Oct. 6, 2009–Jan. 24, 2010

One of the most visited archaeological sites in Mexico, featured on UNESCO’s World Heritage List since 1987, the ancient city of Teotihuacan has fascinated ever since it was first discovered by the Aztecs in the 13th century, 600 years after it had been abandoned. At its peak, in the period 150–450 A.D., it covered more than 11 square miles and was home to more 100,000 people (some estimates go as high as 250,000), making it one of the largest cities in the ancient world. But the impressive architectural remains are not the only vestiges, for the site has yielded up many smaller artifacts, including some exceptional artworks. With 95 percent of the exhibits in the Quai-Branly show hailing from Mexican collections, this will be the first time most of these objects have been seen in Europe, and indeed anywhere outside Mexico, since many of them were only recently discovered during archaeological digs. Highlights include an enormous statue of a sacred jaguar, fragments of wall paintings from the "Pyramid of the Plumed Serpent," and a splendid collection of masks.

"Renoir in the 20th Century," Galeries nationales du Grand Palais, Sept. 23, 2009–Jan. 4, 2010

"I’m beginning to know how to paint. It’s taken me over 50 years of work to achieve this result, which is still far from complete." So declared Auguste Renoir in 1913, at the advanced age of 72, just six years before his death. It is his lesser-known — and perhaps under-appreciated — late period that forms the subject of this exhibition, with over 100 paintings, drawings, and sculptures from the years 1890–1919. Without rejecting Impressionism, Renoir sought to make his work more classical, decorative, and timeless, in reference to the historic masters he admired, including Raphael, Titian, and Rubens (which explains the prevalence of female nudes in his final years). Although sidelined today, Renoir’s late works were much admired at the time by the younger generation just then emerging, and pieces by some of these artists—including Matisse and Picasso—have been hung next to Renoir’s, setting them in their context on the cusp of the 20th century’s avant-gardes. This collaborative show will subsequently travel to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (Feb. 14–May 9, 2010) and the Philadelphia Museum of Art (June 17–Sept. 6, 2010). Also at the Grand Palais, as part of the current "Season of Turkey in France," is the exhibition "From Byzantium to Istanbul, a Port for Two Continents" (Oct. 10, 2009–Jan. 25, 2010), with over 300 objects illustrating the long history of the former imperial capital.

"Fellini, la Grande Parade," Jeu de Paume, Oct. 20, 2009–Jan. 17, 2010