Explore the new Gallery of Time!

2024 marked the beginning of a new chapter in the museum’s history. More than 10 years since it was inaugurated, the Gallery of Time – the heart of the Louvre-Lens museum, and a symbol of its identity – has been renewed and expanded.
Since the museum first opened its doors, the Gallery of Time has offered visitors a unique experience, free of charge, in an open-plan space covering some 3,000 m². Today, it showcases more than 250 masterpieces from the Musée du Louvre in a display that has been further enriched by loans from other major national collections and contemporary works of art.

Why update the Gallery of Time?
In 2024, the Gallery of Time is honouring the Louvre-Lens’s founding promise and completely revamping the selection of works on display, so that visitors can enjoy an even greater selection of the riches contained in France’s national collections. In keeping with the Gallery’s core principles, this new exhibition proposes a journey along the ‘River of Time’, on which visitors are free to navigate as they please.

Navigating the ‘River of Time’?
The Gallery of Time invites visitors to journey along the ‘River of Time’ and to chart a course through the works in the exhibition. The river can be navigated in a number of ways, downstream and up, to reveal a wealth of possible perspectives.
Each visitor is free to follow their own path through art and time while each stop along the way will be an opportunity for a close encounter with a particular work of art, and for a conversation between civilisations.
Where do the works in the Gallery of Time come from?
The Gallery of Time showcases works from the 4th millennium BCE to the mid-19th century, most of which come from the collections of the Musée du Louvre.
This wealth has been further enhanced by pieces on loan from the Musée d’Archéologie nationale – Domaine national de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, the Musée du quai Branly – Jacques Chirac and the Musée national des arts asiatiques – Guimet.
The contemporary works on display at various points throughout the exhibition testify to the contemporary relevance of art history and the importance of artists’ perspectives on our past and present.

The Gallery of Time: a shared experience

I am delighted and honoured to embark on this new decade for the Gallery of Time alongside all of the Louvre-Lens’s visitors. The Gallery is an expression of openness and exchange, and embodies the founding values of the Louvre-Lens: excellence, accessibility and simplicity, curiosity and learning, and a whole range of emotions, from laughter to tears, coming together in a profound experience of freedom.
True to the principles that have led to the Gallery being acclaimed internationally for its innovation, this new exhibition has been conceived as a ‘River of Time’ on which visitors can travel freely.
It also includes a whole new approach to outreach and education, one which was developed in collaboration with more than 200 local residents.
This extraordinary project has generated unrivalled enthusiasm, curiosity, and engagement on the part of the museum’s visitors, as they set the scene for the arrival and presentation of this new selection of some of humanity’s greatest masterpieces.

A reimagined ‘River of Time’

Conceived by Atelier AtoY, the Gallery of Time’s new layout retains the sense of freedom that goes hand in hand with artistic encounters. This notion, initially developed by the SANAA agency, by the team at the museum, led by Henri Loyrette, and by Studio Adrien Gardère, has now been adapted to accommodate the arrival of 250 new works and in light of the decade and more in which the museum has welcomed and interacted with its visitors.
While each work has its own space in which it can be considered, the Gallery’s layout also enables viewers to consider the ways in which a work intersects with or diverges from others. There is no ‘correct way’ to experience the exhibition, and this creates a wealth of points of view and perspectives.

Floating scenography

The project, led by Atelier AtoY, was conceived in line with the museum’s distinctive architecture, created by the SANAA agency.
The new look ‘River of Time’ blends naturally into the gallery, with its gentle slope and abundance of natural light.
The presence and delicacy of the space create an impression of floating, giving it an ethereal quality.
Visitors are encouraged to wander freely along the curves and currents of the ‘River of Time’ and to generate their own itineraries and experiences.
The new layout takes the experience of freedom that defines the Gallery of Time and extends it.

Great care was taken to maintain the integrity of the site and the exceptional architecture devised by SANAA, made up as it is of aluminium walls and concrete flooring. The calm, peaceful, low-contrast, and gentle atmosphere seems almost to compel contemplation.
We sought to preserve this spirit through the use of colour; the gallery furnishings blend seamlessly with the concrete floor, almost to the point of disappearing, thus bringing the works of art to even greater prominence as they seem to float in space.

Virginie Peyturaux, Scenographer, Atelier AtoY

Guest artworks at the very heart of the Gallery

An extension of time and space

The Gallery of Time’s scope and flow have been extended chronologically and geographically with the inclusion of works from other major national museum collections and works by contemporary artists.
Twenty or so works from the Musée d’Archéologie Nationale – Domaine National de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, the Musée du Quai Branly – Jacques Chirac, and the Musée National des Arts Asiatiques – Guimet interact and engage with the Musée du Louvre’s collections. They can be seen on the banks of the ‘River of Time’, from the 3rd millennium BCE all the way through to the 19th century.

Contemporary perspectives on the Gallery of Time

Linking the artworks of antiquity with the world of today, seven contemporary artists explore and interrogate the masterpieces on show in the Gallery of Time. These artists offering audiences their own contemporary perspectives:
• Simone Fattal (born 1942 in Damascus, Syria), The Avenging Angel, 2021
• Giulia Andreani (born 1985 in Venice, Italy), Les Cafus (Europe and Cadmus), 2024
• Jean Claracq (born 1991 in Bayonne, France), Monument 1, 2024
• Kent Monkman (born 1965 in St. Marys, Ontario, Canada), The Pariah, 2020
• Zanele Muholi (born 1972 in Umlazi, South Africa), Muholi V, 2022
• Eva Nielsen (born 1983 in Les Lilas, France), Doline, 2023.

Roméo Mivekannin, the flip side of time

Free exhibition in the Glass Pavilion

Roméo Mivekannin weaves connections between history and our contemporary world. His paintings and sculptures explore layers of shared memory, particularly between Africa and Europe.

Over the past few years, Roméo has been revisiting milestones in the history of painting, selected for the most part from the Musée du Louvre’s collections. His interpretation of Théodore Géricault’s Raft of the Medusa, for example, opens this exhibition.
More information

Exceptional support from the Louvre-Lens' longstanding partners

The new Gallery of Time has benefited immensely from the generous support of the Louvre-Lens’s key, longstanding partners. Crédit Agricole Nord de France have been exceptional partners in the construction and maintenance of the museum, and the Louvre-Lens has also enjoyed specific support from the Hauts-de-France Region, the French Ministries of Culture and the Environment, as well as the Ministry for Decentralisation and Partnerships with Territories, via the National Fund for Territorial Planning and Development.

The teams at the Louvre-Lens would like to extend their particular thanks to all the neighbours, patrons, students, schoolchildren, residents and patients, and to all the facilitators, supervisors and teachers who took part in an unprecedented collective project, working in collaboration with the museum’s education and outreach teams:

Savary Ferry vocational lycée, Arras – students studying for the vocational baccalaureate in beauty care and hairdressing; L’Art&fact, Béthune – art therapists; Institut de Genech – students studying for vocational qualifications in commerce and sales; Henri Senez vocational lycée, Hénin-Beaumont – students studying for the vocational baccalaureate in catering and restaurant services; La Vie Active (‘Active Life’), Isbergues – residents; Cité éducative, Lens – secondary school students; Alfred Maës School, Lens – CM2 pupils (ages 10/11 yrs); Auguste Béhal lycée, Lens – students studying for the general and technology baccalaureate; Youth Mission, Lens-Liévin; Maison du 9, Lens – a community centre for the museum’s neighbours; Vachala socio-cultural centre, Lens; Lens, Jerem and Kraska – graffiti artists and supporters of RC Lens football club; Lens Hospital Services – residents of the Mongré residential home for the elderly (EHPAD); Lens Hospital Services – children from the CMPP child psychiatry unit; Université d’Artois, Lens – students from the GEA2 Human Resources Management course; Lens APSA; Educational Success Plan (PRE), Libercourt – students; George Sand School, Liévin – students from the CM1 and CM2 Arts and Sciences class (ages 9/10 and 10/11 yrs); The Femmes en Avant (‘Women Leading the Way’) Association, Liévin; Sciences Po, Lille – students on the Master’s programme in Cultural Institution Management; students in the vocational training programme at Pierre Mendès France lycée, Bruay-la-Buissière; La Vie Active, Noeux-les-Mines, Medical and Educational Institute (IME); Social Cohesion Department, Rouvroy town, in association with choreographer Sylvain Groud from the Ballet du Nord – National Centre for Choreography, Roubaix – Hauts-de-France; Cours Florent, Brussels (Belgium) – first-year drama students in association with director Damien Chardonnet; Institut Sainte-Marie, Brussels (Belgium) – visual arts students; Pilot-visit testing: residents of the Courrières Day Care Centre (Service d’Accueil de Jour – SAJ).