Musée d’Art Moderne de Paris

Museums are built to house collective memories. 

Through the objects in their archives, they tell the story of the past.  

Sometimes, the aim of a museum has been ideological; to highlight (or even subvert) the story of a period in a nation’s past to make it appear more glorious, while remaining silent about other subject matters. 

At other times, objects have appeared more randomly in the archives, having been donated by various benefactors throughout the years.

Then there are museums dedicated to the exploration of art. 

For centuries, artists and craftsmen were the same, and fine art was defined by the quality of the craftsmanship. 

With the advent of modernity, this changed. 

Art was no longer as much about skills as it was about conceptual thinking. To be avant garde in the modern era was to push conceptual boundaries, not refining the strokes of your brush. 

Musée d’Art Moderne de Paris captures this pivotal shift in modern art, showcasing the impact of the machine age on the art world. 

It is a fascinating place as it offers an exploration of modernist aesthetics. 

Hyphenated MAM Paris, it is a major municipal museum, dedicated to modern and contemporary art of the 20th and 21st centuries, including monumental murals by Raoul Dufy, Gaston Suisse, and Henri Matisse.

The museum is in the eastern with of the Palais de Tokyo, and the entire building was constructed for the International Exhibition of Art and Technology of 1937. 

The style of the compound reflected the Fascist thoughts that defined this decade, foreshadowing the war that was to break out, only two years later. 

At the beginning of the exhibition period, only two pavilions had been completed, Nazi Germany’s and the Soviet Union’s, placed facing one another, as two nations ready to go into combat.

Musée d’Art moderne de Paris