The Musée Marmottan holds the largest collection of Monet's work in the world, more than a hundred paintings spanning his entire career from the 1860s to the Nymphéas of the 1920s. It also holds the painting that gave Impressionism its name, Impression, soleil levant, painted in 1872 and shown at the first Impressionist exhibition in 1874, where a hostile critic used the title to mock the movement and the name stuck.
The museum is in the 16th arrondissement, in a former hunting lodge that Paul Marmottan turned into a mansion in the Empire style. The building itself is part of the visit, with the ground-floor furniture and decoration intact, giving the art a context most museums cannot offer.
What you will see
Impression, soleil levant. The 1872 painting that gave Impressionism its name, mocked by a hostile critic at the 1874 exhibition until the insult became the label, hangs here among more than a hundred works by Monet across his whole career.
Around Monet. The large late paintings of the Giverny garden from his final decade, when his sight was failing and the work was turning toward abstraction, the Wildenstein donation of Impressionist and Post-Impressionist works, Berthe Morisot, Renoir and Pissarro among them, and the Empire-style mansion itself, its ground-floor rooms kept with their original furniture, a rare intact example of style Empire interior.
Impression, soleil levant · the late Monet · the Empire mansion
Pépin's advice
This tour pairs naturally with the Art Nouveau walk. The Marmottan is fifteen minutes from Guimard's buildings in the 16th arrondissement, and the two together make a coherent morning.
Combine it with Giverny. For anyone drawn to Monet's work, the Marmottan followed by a full-day excursion to Giverny is the natural pairing.
