Sunday, March 6, 2011

Poupées de Cire

Louis XV and Mozart at the home of the Marquise de Pompadour

Le Musée Grévin is a waxwork museum in Paris located on the Grands Boulevards in the IXe arrondissement on the right bank of the Seine, at 10, Boulevard Montmartre, Paris, France. It is open daily; an admission fee is charged.

The museum was founded in 1882 by Arthur Meyer, a journalist for Le Gaulois, and named for its first artistic director, caricaturist Alfred Grévin. It is one of the oldest wax museums in Europe. Its baroque architecture includes a mirrored mirage room based on the principle of a catoptric cistula and a theater for magic shows.

Le Musée Grévin now contains some 300 characters arranged in scenes from the history of France and modern life, including a panorama of French history from Charlemagne to Napoleon III, bloody scenes of the French Revolution, movie stars, and international figures such as Albert Einstein, Mahatma Gandhi, and Pope John Paul II. The tableau of Charlotte Corday murdering Jean-Paul Marat includes the actual knife and bathtub used.

Louis Aragon wrote poems under the name of Le Musée Grévin (using the pseudonym of François la Colère), published during the Vichy regime by the Éditions de Minuit underground editor.

No comments: