Musée d'Orsay

About Musée d'Orsay

The Musée d'Orsay holds the world's largest collection of Impressionist and Post-Impressionist art, with works by Monet, Degas, Renoir, Van Gogh, Cezanne, and Gauguin filling its galleries. The building itself is part of the appeal. It was originally the Gare d'Orsay, a railway station completed in 1900 for the Paris World's Fair, and its soaring iron-and-glass hall still reads unmistakably as a station. The great gilded clock on the upper level is one of the most photographed spots in the city, and the view through its glass face toward the Seine and Montmartre is reason enough to climb up.

The collection is arranged roughly to bridge the gap between the Louvre and the Centre Pompidou, covering Western art from about 1848 to 1914. Van Gogh's self-portraits, Monet's series paintings, Manet's "Olympia," and Degas's dancers are among the best-known pieces, but the museum also holds sculpture, decorative arts, photography, and architecture from the same decades. The Impressionist galleries on the upper floor tend to draw the biggest crowds, so many visitors head straight up there first before working back down through the earlier rooms.

The museum sits on the Left Bank of the Seine, directly across the river from the Tuileries and an easy walk from the Louvre and the Orangerie, which makes it simple to pair with other art stops in one day. It is closed on Mondays, and lines at the main entrance can be long in high season, so timed or skip-the-line entry is worth having in advance. Most visits run two to three hours, though the collection easily absorbs a half day if you want to slow down. A separate ticket is required for entry.