The Marvelous Marmottan

Perspectives from The Artist's Road

The Musée Marmottan Monet in Paris
(photo courtesy Musée Marmottan)

The Musée Marmottan Monet is not located near the Louvre or the Musée d’Orsay or the Orangerie and therefore sometimes can be overlooked in a hurried trip to visit the famous art museums of Paris. But the former hunting lodge of the Duke of Valmy is only a 15-minute Uber ride away from the heart of the Paris cultural downtown—and, its collections are spectacular.

The house sits at the edge of the Bois de Boulogne. The Marmottan family, who bought the house in 1882, avidly collected furniture, sculptures and paintings. They eventually bestowed the home and their collections to the Académie des Beaux-Arts which opened it in 1934 as the Musée Marmottan.

In 1957, the daughter of Dr. Georges de Bellio (doctor to many of the Impressionists, including Monet and Renoir), bequeathed her father’s collection to the museum. In 1966, Monet’s son, Michel Monet, …