METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART

You could spend a whole week visiting this huge museum. The main entrance, across from 82nd Street, is crowned with grand staircases. You can also use the basement entrance opposite 81st Street. Everything is said in the slogan of the Met: 5 000 years of Art or "5 000 years of Art"! This New York institution, the local equivalent of our Louvre, was founded in 1870 by a group of prominent citizens of finance, industry and the arts. It was then a bizarre little building, glimpsed in Scorsese's film, The Age of Innocence. The museum occupies the equivalent of four blocks. It is said that it would take a lifetime to discover the nearly 2 million works of art housed in the Met's 18 departments over 600 square miles, and another lifetime to absorb their significance in space and time: the museum brings together art from 5,000 years of the most diverse civilizations (China, the Far East, Egypt, Assyria, Greece, Rome, Africa, Oceania, Europe, the Islamic world, the Americas), from prehistory to the present. The Metropolitan accumulated its treasures for 90 years before building the galleries where they are displayed. A visit of a few hours, if one wanted to see everything (assuming that it is possible), would be a marathon that would border on the absurd. However, the Metropolitan Museum, like the rest of America, is devoid of works from the Pre-Raphaelite school! Another difficulty: given the quantity of works that the museum possesses, certain collections are only visible according to a rotation schedule. The Met has five major collections: Egyptian antiquities, primitive arts, medieval art, European and American painting. More than a simple exhibition, it offers a real immersion. Within the museum itself, for example, a medieval church has been partially reconstructed, the interior of a room from the time of Louis XIV or Louis XVI, or a villa from Pompeii. In addition to the five major collections, there are also entire wings devoted to modern art, musical instruments, weapons and armor, Islamic art, ancient Near Eastern art, Greek and Roman art (the second largest collection in the world after that of the Athens museums), European sculptures, decorative arts, etc. From Egyptian statuary to Byzantine jewelry, from Florentine and Venetian paintings and porcelain to the primitive treasures in the Michael C. Rockefeller wing (opened after the end of the Second World War), the collection is a unique and comprehensive one. Rockefeller wing (opened after Nelson Rockefeller's son died in New Guinea in 1961), from 18th and 19th century American artists to the impressive collection of French Impressionist and Post-Impressionist painters, English, Flemish, Dutch, Spanish, Italian... You could devote your entire stay to visiting this fortress embedded in Central Park. The museum is so big that you will never have the feeling of an overflow of tourists (except when you have to queue at the entrance, of course). The rooms are large and the circulation is easy. Among the works not to be missed are Auguste Rodin's statue The Burghers of Calais in the sculpture wing, Jackson Pollock's famous painting Rhythm of Autumn, Vincent Van Gogh's Self-Portrait in a Straw Hat, Claude Monet's La Grenouillère, the Egyptian funerary portraits, the Sphinx of Hatshepsut, the Byzantine galleries, Self-portrait in 1660 by Rembrandt, Diptych byVan Eyck, Portrait of the Princess of Broglie by Ingres, the sculpture Seated Couple in the arts of Africa section, Gertrude Stein by Picasso, Cypress by Van Gogh, the collection of the Impressionists... The highlight of the ancient Egyptian collection is the gigantic Temple of Dendur (or Temple of Isis), a real Egyptian temple that was commissioned by the Emperor Augustus and built around 15 BC, not far from the city of Aswan. In 1965, Egypt donated the Nubian temple to the United States, and the 800-ton structure was shipped to America before being installed at the Met in 1978.

Knowing all this, you will have to make a very subjective choice before rushing into the museum. It's best to choose on the map whether your preference is for Japanese weapons or Impressionist painters. It is impossible to see everything, unless you want to devote your entire stay to the museum. Note that the audio commentary in French could not be more disappointing, and only focuses on a very small number of works, we do not recommend it. Before going out, don't miss to have a look at the art stores of the museum, which offer magnificent reproductions at affordable prices. The Cantor Roof Garden Bar on the fifth floor's panoramic terrace offers a beautiful view of Central Park and New York (open from May to late fall, depending on the weather, from 11am to 4:30pm Monday to Thursday and Sunday, and on Fridays and Saturdays from 10am to 10pm), especially since in this outdoor space contemporary art is also exhibited in the summer. In 2008, for example, Jeff Koons' metal balloons found their place there for a few months.