Saturday, July 10, 2010

Crime and Punishment in Musée d'Orsay


Books and music are not all acts of culture that I admire ...

During one of my last trips to Paris I visited Musée d'Orsay. This museum is one of the best art museum in Europe, and its collections of impressionists are just superb.

However, that time I was able to see the special exhibition „Crime and punishment”. It was an incredible collection of mostly paintings that addressed the theme of crime, death and penalties.


Starting with depiction of the forefather of all criminals —Cain, we go through the history of art with the focus on the dark side of human race. We can witness how the reaction of artists varied in time of Enlightenment, Romanticism, Positivism and Surrealism.

We could witness how the nascent press devoted it columns to crime (Le Petit Journal) , we could see the modern ideas for prisons (Panopticon), and contemplate upon artistic debate over death penalty...

One of the objects on the display was the real guillotine, dressed in a vail ...




The exhibition was depressing ... but it was still worth to see.

2 comments:

  1. Thanks Paul. That was great exhibition — something that retains in one's memory ...

    ReplyDelete

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