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Louvre Museum Facts

Louvre Museum Facts
The Louvre Museum is a world famous museum located in Paris, France. It is the largest museum in the world and it is also the most visited museum in the world. It is home to more than 380,000 pieces of art ranging from sculptures to paintings, as well as many other historically significant objects. The Louvre Museum is part of the original Louvre Palace which began as a fortress, built in 1190 by Philip II. Only remnants of the original palace remain in the museum's basement today. During the Middle Ages the Louvre Palace was altered many times. Its use has also varied over the years, from a museum, a residence, a prison, and even as a storage building for stolen art by the Nazis in World War II.
Interesting Louvre Museum Facts:
In the 1300s the Louvre was changed from a fortress into a royal palace by Charles V.
Francis I renovated the Louvre in 1546. During his rule Francis acquired many of the Louvre's main art pieces, including the Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci.
The Louvre fell into disrepair in the 1600s because Louis XIV decided he would reside in Versailles instead of the royal palace.
For several years the Louvre became an artist's residence.
In the 1700s pressure to turn the Louvre into a public museum was successful, and when Louis XVI was imprisoned in 1792 the royal collection became the property of France.
The Louvre Museum opened on August 10th, 1793 with 184 art objects and 537 paintings.
In 1796 the Louvre was closed and underwent some structural repairs, and was reopened in 1801.
In 1803 the Louvre was renamed by Napoleon to the 'Musée Napoléon'. Napoleon greatly expanded the museum's collection, often by force, but once he was defeated many pieces of art were returned to their rightful owners.
During World War II the Nazis hid a lot of stolen art in the Louvre, and Nazi leaders would choose whichever pieces they liked for their personal collections.
The Louvre Museum's Pyramid was built in 1989, using almost 700 glass panes. It is 20 meters in height and covers 1,225 square meters.
The Mona Lisa, one of the most famous pieces of art at the Louvre Museum, was stolen in 1911. It was returned two years later. It is now housed behind bullet proof glass in its own climate-controlled room in the Louvre.
The Louvre Museum's galleries have been expanded over the years to more than 652,000 square feet. This is divided into eight departments: Near Eastern Antiquities, Greek, Etruscan, and Roman Antiquities, Egyptian Antiquities, Paintings, Prints and Drawings, Decorative Arts, Sculptures, and Islamic Art.
Although there are more than 380,000 pieces of art housed at the Louvre, only approximately 35,000 are on display.
There is so much art housed in the Louvre that it would take a person 100 days to view all of it. A person would have to look at a different piece of art every 30 seconds for 100 days with no breaks in order to see all of it.
More than 15,000 people visit the Louvre Museum each day.


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