Branly Museum in Paris. Quai Branly Museum (Paris, France)

The ethnographic museum on the Quai Branly (Le musée du quai Branly) became famous already at the stage of discussion of the project, the concept proposed for its implementation was so fresh and original.

From idea to discovery

In 1996, French President J. Chirac was the first to suggest the creation of a new type of ethnographic museum. According to him, the main goal of the new institution of science and culture should be to improve relations with the non-European world. The concept of the museum implies that the exhibits collected here should appear to visitors as close as possible to the real conditions of their use, for which the most advanced technical means of visualizing the situation, identical to the place of their creation and existence, are used.

The project implementation time took a whole decade, during which disputes about the expediency of creating a museum, completing the collection and preserving the historical appearance of the center of Paris did not subside. Only after reaching a consensus did the time come for the implementation of the project developed by the architect J. Nouvel. The opening of the museum took place in the presence of UN Secretary General K. Anan in early summer 2006.

Museum architecture and organization of the exposition space

The building has a simple geometric shape resembling an elongated box 220 meters long with slightly truncated corners. Above the ground, it is supported by 26 pillars arranged in an asymmetric manner. The main entrance to the museum leads to a spacious foyer, from which visitors, accompanied by the quiet roar of tam-tams, tambourines and other percussion instruments, climb a wide staircase to the beginning of the exhibition.

The museum on the Quai Branly does not have the usual enfilade of rooms, or long passages between them. All 5,000 m2 of exhibition space can be seen at a glance. The huge hall, 200 meters long and 20 to 35 meters wide, is divided in the center only by a serpentine sofa-partition of a biomorphic shape.

Of the more than 300 thousand artifacts collected in the museum's funds, no more than 3.5 thousand exhibits are available for viewing at the same time. The main principle adopted as the basis for building the exposition is the geographic zoning of the Earth. All exhibits of the museum are presented in five sections, reflecting the originality of the history and culture of the peoples of South and North America, Africa, Asia, Australia and Oceania. All exhibits are deliberately devoid of comments, and the boundaries between sections of the exposition can only be determined by the color of the floor, which symbolizes each continent.

Within the sections, the exhibits are grouped in chronological order, but associative links between objects are of no less importance. In general, not one of the principles of building an exposition is transparent, and it is obvious that the museum curators do not focus on the traditional systematic approach, but on emotional perception, provoking a culture shock.

In the permanent exhibition of the museum, it is realistic to simultaneously place no more than 1% of the exhibits from the variety that is stored in the museum funds. Numerous photographs, audio and video materials can be found in the museum's media libraries equipped with the latest technology. Other objects are displayed as part of thematic exhibitions, the schedule of which is drawn up 12 years in advance.

In 2016, a significant part of the exhibition space was occupied by the exposition "White Man, Black Man", which reveals aspects of the mutual influence of African and European art in the 20th century. At the same time, there is an opportunity to visit the exhibition "Jacques Chirac and the Dialogue of Cultures" organized for the 10th anniversary of the museum. Through several hundred paintings, documents and exhibits from Asia and Latin America, it recreates the cultural portrait of the former President of France.

P. Blanc's vertical gardens

The main façade of the museum on the Quai Branly became a special, completely unlike anything exposition of the museum. It is very unusual to see the densely vegetated walls of a modern building in a big city.

The designer and botanist of world renown P. Blanc spent about 10 years to create this modern miracle. During this time, he conducted fieldwork in the mountains of Thailand and Malaysia, studying natural plant communities and doing painstaking laboratory research at the National Center for Scientific Research.

The technology he developed is based on the use of a two-layer polyamide fabric with a PVC foam pad, fixed on a vertical metal crate. The nutrients necessary for plant growth are supplied to the roots through a drip irrigation system. The total load on the structure does not exceed 30 kg per 1 m2.

15,000 specimens of 150 species of herbs, mosses, ferns and even shrubs are used in the living canvas that envelops the facade. Heuchera, ivy, honeysuckle, geraniums, sage and other plants, carefully selected for the installation, create original, eye-catching patterns of various green tones with the addition of brown, yellow and red. This incredible wall of living plants is unlikely to ever fade from memory.

How to get there

Ticket price

• Adult: 10 €
• Reduced: 7 €

If you walk along the left side of the Seine next to the Eiffel Tower, near the Louvre and the Tokyo Palace, you can see a structure that you cannot pass by. From the ground to the roof, it is covered with tropical vines and colorful exotic plants. The vertical garden is the decoration of the museum, which made it the main attraction of the embankment.

The museum itself on the Quai Branly in Paris is an ethnographic, cultural heritage of a new type, a center for the study of forgotten civilizations, a place where public events are held.

History of creation

The solemn announcement of the construction of the museum was made by the President of the French Republic in 1996. The author of the building was the famous French architect and designer Jean Nouvel. The first step in the creation of the museum was the opening in the Pavilion of Sessions of the department of ethnic art of non-European civilizations. It featured more than 120 exhibits.

Jacques Chirac, a great connoisseur of primitivist and oriental art, closely followed the progress of construction and personally participated in its opening in 2006. The official name "Museum Quai Branly" comes from the location to avoid any association with its contents. Although you can often hear a museum of "primitive arts" or "a look at the Other."

Museum collection

It is based on the collection of the National Museum of Africa and Oceania, as well as the former Museum of Man. Now it has collected 300 thousand objects of art. The structure looks like a box hanging over a real forest. As conceived by the architect, this is the environment for the existence of objects in it.

There are no separate rooms in the building itself. Displaying the continuity and unity of world civilizations, expositions from different countries and continents merge and smoothly move from one to another. The roar of tom-toms, tambourines and other musical instruments, also presented in the museum, can be heard from the speakers.

The walls are decorated with murals made by Australian Aborigines and curtains by Japanese designer Issei Miyake. The symbol of the museum is the polychrome female figurine "La Chupicuaro", 31 cm high, made of baked clay and representing the pre-Columbian era.

The largest exhibit is a red stone structure of volcanic origin in the form of a lyre, the stone for which was brought from Senegal. With a height of 240 cm and a width of 160 cm, weighing more than 6 tons, it was installed before the creation of the roof. It is located in the department of art of the peoples of Africa and is adjacent to a wooden statue of the Dogon from Mali of the 11th-12th centuries.

Another attraction that collects numerous excursions is the "Paris Skull". Belonging to the Aztec civilization, it is carved from a single piece of crystal and weighs 2.5 kg.

A gift from Swiss collectors was added to the already existing items: the only property in the world of ethnic jewelry and jewelry from Asian countries. During the whole time only 3500 exhibits were involved. The rest participate in thematic shows, the release date of which is scheduled for 12 years.

P. Blanc's vertical gardens

The museum is famous not only for its collection, but also for the largest plant wall. The structure is immersed in a forest of 15,000 plants of 150 species from around the world. Living canvas is one of the works of Patrick Blanc.

P. Blanc is a famous French designer and inventor of landscaped vertical gardens. He spent about 10 years creating a technology with which, even in a harsh climate, stone walls can be turned into a tropical jungle that blooms at any time of the year. The plants are grown hydroponically and do not require soil. Watering is carried out by drip. The garden performs not only decorative properties, but also should protect the museum in case of flooding.

The Quai Branly Museum is not an address, it is the official name of the Museum of Primitive Art of the peoples of Africa, Asia, Oceania and America.

But the address, of course, too. Opened in 2006 at the initiative of French President Jacques Chirac, who was fond of ethnography, the museum is indeed located on the Quai Branly, a stone's throw from the Eiffel Tower. It is impossible to pass by - it can be seen from afar: huge mirrored windows and a wall covered with greenery. Mosses, flowers, climbing plants. This is Patrick Blanc's famous vertical garden. A metal frame is attached to the wall, on it are layers of polyamide that support the roots of plants, a nutrient solution flows down the capillaries from top to bottom. Blanc, a cheerful man with green hair, popularizes vertical gardens around the world, the Branly Museum is one of his most famous projects. In winter, the wind from the Seine sometimes damages the plants, but the rest of the year the wall looks fantastic.

The part of the building that is not occupied by greenery looks no less surprising: it is multi-colored (mostly in red-lilac tones), stands on stilts, and parallelepipeds of various sizes protrude from the sides. The building was designed by the famous French architect Jean Nouvel, and the garden in which it is located is the landscape designer Gilles Clement. The garden is separated from the embankment by a glass wall - 200 meters long and 9 meters high. You can go behind it and take a free walk among the reservoirs and hills, breathe in the aroma of exotic flowers and feel a little bit in the jungle.

It is even strange to remember that there is also a museum itself. And it is worth seeing, although only 3500 of the 300 thousand exhibits are on display (their change is thought out for several years in advance). Masks, figurines, tom-toms, tambourines, drums, carpets, skins, tomahawks - all this is located in the hall without explanations and signs, at first glance, even haphazardly. The meaning of this "unsystematic" is understandable - peering into the artifacts of a foreign culture, the visitor involuntarily begins to reflect, compare, reflect. True, he will no longer think about the collection of mummified heads of Maori warriors - the Branly Museum had to solemnly return 20 tattooed heads to New Zealand, whose authorities for a long time demanded back the objects of national culture exported by Europeans.

The museum has a multimedia library, a theater and a restaurant overlooking the Seine and the Eiffel Tower, where the bewildered tourist can finally come to his senses.

Not far from attractions such as the Eiffel Tower and the Louvre, there is an impressive ethnographic treasure, the Branly Museum, which is impressive in its scale. Officially, it is called a little differently, the Quai Branly Museum. That is, in full accordance with its location in the seventh district of the French capital, on the left bank of the Seine. All of its exhibits can be described in one word: exotic. In a different way, samples of the native art of the indigenous peoples of Asia, Africa, America and Oceania, of which there are no less than 300 thousand, probably cannot be named. But no matter how critical the art historians are about this museum, considering it to be overly theatrical with a bias towards the attractiveness of external attributes to the detriment of cognitive and informative content, many people visit it with pleasure and interest.

Museum "three in one"

The museum itself, of course, categorically disagrees with such remarks. On the contrary, this institution positions itself as a kind of know-how in the field of culture, combining three main vectors of activity - museum, educational and scientific. But the matter is not limited to this, since social events are regularly held here, which makes the Branly Museum also an institution of the club direction. The museum complex itself combines several buildings, including a park area. Three and a half thousand exhibits are exhibited in the main one. For ease of perception, they were arranged according to the geographical principle. First we see the works of the indigenous peoples of Africa, then Asia and then Oceania and America.

Such a unique and innovative museum was opened in June 2006. This event was preceded by ten years of painstaking work that were spent on the construction and collection of exhibits. The initiator of its creation was the then President of France, Jacques Chirac. After the head of state voiced his idea - by the way, he himself is a big fan of indigenous culture - a special commission was formed in 1995. She carefully studied all the pros and cons and finally came to the decision that there should be such a museum in Paris! The building of the museum, no less exotic than its collections, was designed by the famous French architect Jean Nouvel. But the so-called living wall of various plants (including exotic ones), two hundred meters long and twelve high, looking like a real jungle, was invented and planted by Patrick Blanc and Gilles Clement. Thanks to the presence of irrigation and drainage systems, plants continue to live and delight with the brightness of colors. The staff gardeners of the museum take care of all this splendor.

What are the exhibits?

We have already said that the permanent exhibition of the museum has 3,500 exhibits out of 300,000 available. Where are the rest, you ask? In the vaults, since there is not enough space for them in the main building. Part of the collection is presented in the form of photographs, audio recordings and film documents. There are a lot of them, they are dispersed in media libraries and are quite accessible for viewing. As for other collections, they have committed to show them ... within the next decade. This will happen within the framework of specially organized exhibitions, each of which will feature new exhibits.

Under the roof of the Branly Museum are the unique collections of the ethnographic department of the Museum of Man and the National Museum of African and Oceanic Art (the latter is currently closed). Here, connoisseurs of exotic trends in culture and fine arts can enjoy the works of native Australian artists: John Mavurnjul, Kathleen Petiar, Ningura Napurrula, Paddy Bedford and others. Some masters of the brush - for example, Napurulla - prefer to emphasize black and white motifs in their works. Looks just great. So much so that the same motifs were used in the design of the ceilings in the part of the museum where its management is located.

Some interesting facts

1. The Branly Museum might not have seen the light if the famous Louvre had been… more spacious. The fact is that at first there was an idea to create an ethnographic department with samples of native art right here. But the management of the Louvre categorically protested.

2. The opening of the museum, which took place on June 23, 2006, was arranged very solemnly. In addition to French President Jacques Chirac and members of the government, then UN Secretary General Kofi Annan was present.

3. The Branly Museum is often criticized for "censorship". Indeed, when selecting exhibits, they were guided by European moral and aesthetic standards, with which the “primitive” value system of the native peoples is not entirely consistent (although, so that no one is offended, it is now called the “original”). Particularly irreconcilable critics see this as a manifestation of neo-colonialism and disrespect for the culture of the natives.

4. Inexperienced viewers involuntarily pay attention to a large glass cylinder containing some dark objects. At first it is difficult to understand what is there. But, looking closely, they see a whole collection of musical instruments from all over the world - drums, tambourines, tom-toms, etc. There are ten thousand of them in total. The exotic thing is that the storage cylinder is equipped with speakers (they are not visible), which quietly transmit their sound.

5. The policy of the museum is aimed at stimulating emotions and imagination in visitors. Therefore, the exhibits do not have the usual regularity in the practice of other museums and are arranged with deliberate arbitrariness. The exhibits do not contain any comments.

6. Surprisingly, among the samples of aboriginal culture one can see ... Christian icons from the Black Continent, adjacent to the cult objects of traditional local beliefs (for example, ritual masks traditional in Equatorial Africa). There are also frescoes here, for example, from the wall of one of the Ethiopian Coptic churches. However, such a contrast is intended to show the diversity of the ethnographic heritage of these peoples and make visitors think about the depth of human nature, its moral, cultural and religious values, regardless of the region of residence.

Address: France, Paris, Quai Branly, 37
www.quaibranly.fr