Description of the attraction
The National Gallery of Modern Art Jeu de Pom is located in the building that Napoleon III built in 1861 in the Tuileries Garden for the ball game (jeu de paume).
This is an ancient game, the ancestor of tennis, spread in European countries since the 13th century. Mentioned in Dumas's novel The Three Musketeers: D'Artagnan played it before an audience with the king. Napoleon III, the last emperor of France, also played it. The building he built, in fact, a tennis court, in its architecture was a twin of the Orangerie, located on the other side of the garden.
Since 1909, the Jeux-de-Pom building has been used for various exhibitions. In 1922, after a large-scale reconstruction, the gallery exhibited its permanent collection, without abandoning temporary exhibitions. During these years Jeux-de-Pom began to intensively acquire the works of outstanding artists - Modigliani, Picasso, Chagall, Soutine, Juan Gris.
During the occupation, the gallery was used by the Nazis as a warehouse for works of art confiscated from the Jewish population. Some of the plundered cultural property was intended for the Fuhrer Museum in Linz. At the same time, the Nazis, who organically did not tolerate the so-called "degenerate art", tried to sell paintings that did not suit them in third countries. Some of the works could not be sold, and on the night of July 27, 1942, they were burned in bonfires near Jeux de Pom (including works by Pablo Picasso and Salvador Dali).
In 1947, the gallery was converted into a museum, exhibiting mainly the work of the Impressionists: excellent natural light created ideal conditions for this. But in 1986, the collection of Impressionist works was handed over to the Museum d'Orsay, and the ballroom was seriously redesigned by the architect Antoine Stinko with a focus on contemporary art.
Today, there are not only exhibition premises, but also an audiovisual hall, a bookstore, and a cafe. The gallery holds exhibitions of contemporary painting and graphics, photography, demonstrates films and videos. In contrast to them behind the huge windows of Jeux-de-Pom are the unchanging Tuileries Gardens, the Seine, Place de la Concorde.
