Palais des Beaux-Arts, Lille

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Palais des Beaux-Arts, Lille

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Façade of the Palace of Fine Arts The museum puts on numerous temporary exhibitions (Goya, Rubens) which strongly contribute to its international renown. © Tibor Bognar - age fotostock

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The Palais des Beaux-Arts in Lille, which is in a building dating back to the 19th Century, was restored between 1991 and 1997, and now offers a setting worthy of its art collections.
The works are displayed over an area of 236,806 sq ft according to the different schools of art they belong to: Flemish, Dutch, Spanish, Italian and French.
Two of the collections in this pictoral panorama ranging from the 16th to the 20th Century are particularly distinguished: the Flemish collection, which includes a number of works by Rubens, and the 19th Century French collection displaying the work of David, Delacroix, Géricault, Corot et Courbet.
The museum's 2,000 canvases are internationally renowned and serve as a point of reference for many specialists and art historians. One reason they visit is to study the 4,000 sheets in the 'Cabinet of drawings', which includes 30 drawings signed by Raphael, and 200 to 300 16th Century Italian drawings.
Another thing that makes this museum so special is that it owns several works that mark decisive moments in the history of painting: David's 'Belisarius', the first Neo-Classical painting (presented to the Paris Salon of 1781); Courbet's 'After Dinner at Ornans' (Salon of 1849), a realist painting going against the grain of the Romantic movement fashionable at the time; Puvis de Chavannes' 'Sleep' (Salon of 1867), in which a foretaste of Picasso's Blue Period can already be seen.
In addition to the permanent collections, the museum also displays many temporary exhibitions (Goya, Berthe Morisot and Rubens) that greatly contribute to its international reputation.
Palais des Beaux-Arts, Lille
Place de la République, 59000 Lille, France.
Tel.: +33 (0)3 20 06 78 00.