Musée National d'Art Moderne
The Musée National d'Art Moderne is France’s national museum of modern and contemporary art, housed inside the Centre Pompidou in Paris.
Centre Pompidou: A Paris cultural complex housing a modern-art museum, public library, and music and acoustic research center. The museum occupies the building’s upper galleries and shares its institutional home.
Palais de Tokyo: A Paris exhibition building opened in 1937 that houses contemporary-art institutions. The national museum first opened there in 1947 before moving to the Centre Pompidou.
Modern art: Art associated with the period of experimentation and social change from the late nineteenth century through much of the twentieth. This broad field forms the historical core of the museum’s collection.
Pablo Picasso: A Spanish artist who helped develop Cubism and worked across painting, sculpture, printmaking, and ceramics. His work anchors the museum’s account of early twentieth-century artistic change.
Musée du Luxembourg: A Paris museum whose changing exhibitions focus on European art, especially from the Renaissance onward. Its earlier role in displaying contemporary French art preceded the national museum’s modern collection.
André Malraux: A French novelist, theorist, and politician who served as minister of cultural affairs from 1959 to 1969. As culture minister, he supported the creation of a major national modern-art museum.
Contemporary art: Art made in the present period, often engaging current social, political, and technological conditions. The museum’s collecting and exhibitions extend beyond historical modernism into current practice.
Henri Matisse: A French artist known for expressive color, simplified forms, and leadership in Fauvism. His paintings represent a major strand of French modernism in the collection.
Musée des Arts Décoratifs: A Paris museum devoted to decorative arts, design, and related visual culture. Its holdings clarify the neighboring design traditions represented alongside modern art in Paris.
Georges Pompidou: A French politician who served as president from 1969 to 1974 and promoted a major Paris cultural center. His initiative led to the cultural complex that became the museum’s home.