Diary of a London (& Parisian) Art Critic

From Le Louvre to Tate Modern

In this post, I summarise every exhibition I’ve seen over the last few weeks, not just those I write about in other publications, and you get my honest thoughts on them. This special edition covers both Paris and London.

Wednesday 11 June (Paris)

I went hard on my first full day in Paris, including the most visited museum in the world.

The chaos in front of the Mona Lisa

The Musée Jacquemart-André was a new find near where I was staying. It has fantastic, opulent interiors, and I was there to see its excellent exhibition on the works of Artemisia Gentileschi (until 3 August, ticketed). She was a phenomenal painter of historic scenes and portraits, and is rightfully a feminist icon. If you missed her National Gallery exhibition, here’s a chance to see a similar exhibition that celebrates this under-appreciated Baroque artist.

Galerie Templon has two spaces within walking distance of one another. I enjoyed Jeanne Vicerial’s works, which cross art and fashion to create black-clad figures - sometimes they appear feminine, other times mutant hybrid forms (until 19 July, free). The other space has the light works of Ivan Navarro, which I wasn’t sold on - pretty to look at but not much more (until 19 July, free).

Now that it’s been restored, I went into Notre-Dame, and you can barely tell there was a fire. They’ve done a fantastic job on this spectacular cathedral. There is a long queue, but it moves fast, so it’s worth waiting.

Le Louvre opens late on Wednesdays, so I queued with my booked ticket and braced myself for the madness. It’s the most visited museum in the world, with 8.7 million visitors in 2024. To put that into context, the British Museum has 6.5 million and it’s free to visit, while Le Louvre is ticketed.

It’s been 15 years since I visited, and I had forgotten how vast it is—think of the National Gallery, the British Museum, and the V&A all rolled into one. Despite this, every room is busy but understandably so given it’s such an impressive collection with masterpieces by pretty much any historical painter you can imagine. There are big hitters like Delacroix’s Liberty Leading the People, Gericault’s Raft of Medusa, Venus de Milo, and the Mona Lisa. It’s the most impressive museum I’ve ever visited.

Beneath the paywall:

• More Parisian highlights, including Hockney and the Musée d’Orsay

• Why an Abstract Erotic show didn’t get me going, but the Summer Exhibition did

• David Attenborough to the latest in graduate art

• Lots more from the London art scene