Louvre

The Louvre is a massive national art museum located in Paris, France.

It serves as a global center for culture and history. The museum is widely considered the most visited art museum in the world. In the 2025 fiscal year, it welcomed 9 million visitors.

The museum attracts a diverse international crowd. In 2012, 73 percent of visitors came from outside France. Only 27 percent of the visitors were French citizens. This institution houses some of the most important works of Western art.

The museum is organized into eight distinct curatorial departments. These departments help categorize the massive collection of objects. The first is Egyptian Antiquities. Next is Near Eastern Antiquities. The third department covers Greek, Etruscan, and Roman Antiquities.

Visitors can also explore Islamic Art. Other departments include Sculpture, Decorative Arts, Paintings, and Prints and Drawings. The museum holds approximately 500,000 objects in its total holdings. However, only about 35,000 works are displayed to the public at one time. These exhibited items range from prehistory to the 21st century. At any given moment, roughly 38,000 objects are on view.

Walking through the museum involves navigating a complex architectural history. The museum is housed within the Louvre Palace. The building has undergone many redesigns and extensions. The main entrance is now located in an underground space. This area is known as the Hall Napoléon. It sits directly beneath the famous Louvre Pyramid.

Visitors can reach this entrance via the Pyramid itself. They can also enter through the underground Carrousel du Louvre commercial mall. A secondary entrance exists at the Denon Wing. This entrance was created in 1999 but is not always open. The museum's layout changed significantly during the Grand Louvre overhaul. This project occurred during the late 1980s and 1990s.

The history of the site began as a military defense. King Philip II started building a fortress in the late 12th or 13th century. This fortress was meant to protect Paris from western attacks.

You can still see the remnants of this Medieval Louvre in the basement crypt. As the city expanded, the fortress lost its defensive purpose. In 1546, Francis I began converting it into a royal residence. He rebuilt it in the French Renaissance style. Later, the building served as a home for artists under royal patronage. The Boulle family, for example, lived there for four generations. In 1682, Louis XIV moved the royal household to the Palace of Versailles. This move changed the Louvre's primary function. It became a place to display the royal art collections.

The transition to a public museum was driven by political change. During the French Revolution, the National Assembly took control of the site. They decreed that the Louvre should display the nation's masterpieces. The museum officially opened on 10 August 1793.

Its first exhibition featured 537 paintings. Most of these works were former property of the kings or the church. The collection grew significantly under Napoleon Bonaparte. During this time, it was even called the Musée Napoléon. Many works were seized from Europe, Egypt, and Syria. However, many of these items were returned after his abdication. The collection grew again during the Second French Empire. During that era, the museum gained 20,000 new pieces. Since the Third Republic, the collection has grown through many donations.

Visiting the museum has changed many times over the centuries. In the early 1800s, public access was very limited. The general public could only visit for four hours each week. This occurred on Saturday and Sunday afternoons. In 1855, the museum opened to the public almost every day. It remained free to enter until 1922. Since 1946, the museum has followed a standard weekly schedule. It is closed to visitors every Tuesday. Modern technology now helps people explore the halls. For many years, the museum used Nintendo 3DS handheld systems.

These guides offered over 30 hours of audio. They also included more than 1,000 photographs of the artwork. These systems used special transmitters to help with navigation. A new guide system is expected to replace them by late 2025.

The Louvre connects art to the broader story of human civilization. It holds iconic sculptures like the Venus de Milo.

It also protects the Winged Victory sculpture. The museum functions as a massive repository for archaeological finds. These finds connect modern viewers to ancient cultures. The collection spans thousands of years of human creativity. It links the ancient world to the modern era. By preserving these objects, the Louvre maintains a record of global history. It remains a vital site for study and wonder.