The Musée des Beaux-Arts de Mulhouse is a municipal

art museum An art museum or art gallery is a building or space for the display of art, usually from the museum's own Collection (artwork), collection. It might be in public or private ownership and may be accessible to all or have restrictions in place. A ...

Mulhouse Mulhouse (; Alsatian language, Alsatian: or , ; ; meaning ''Mill (grinding), mill house'') is a city of the Haut-Rhin Departments of France, department, in the Grand Est Regions of France, region, eastern France, close to the France–Switzerl ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

. It originated with the '' Société industrielle de Mulhouse (SIM)'', a

learned society A learned society (; also learned academy, scholarly society, or academic association) is an organization that exists to promote an discipline (academia), academic discipline, profession, or a group of related disciplines such as the arts and s ...

established in 1826 by local industrialists such as Dollfus, Koechlin, and Schlumberger, which had begun collecting artworks in 1831, and was founded in 1864 by Frédéric Engel-Dollfus.

The building

Since 1985, the museum is housed in a former

hôtel particulier An ''hôtel particulier'' () is a grand townhouse, comparable to the Townhouse (Great Britain), British townhouse or mansion. Whereas an ordinary ''maison'' (house) was built as part of a row, sharing party walls with the houses on either side an ...

, the ''Villa Steinbach'', which consists of a core from 1788 and a wing of 1924, added by the then owner, the SIM. Between 1883 and 1944, the museum had been housed in the monumental building now used for the Musée de l'impression sur étoffes.

The collection

Due to the insufficient size of the current building only a small fraction of the ca. 1,000 paintings in the collection can be shown. Over half of the paintings still belong to the ''Société industrielle de Mulhouse'' and are on permanent loan to the museum. Many of the paintings belonging to the SIM were purchased at the

Salon de Paris The Salon (french: Salon), or rarely Paris Salon (French: ''Salon de Paris'' ), beginning in 1667 was the official art exhibition of the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Between 1748 and 1890 it was arguably the greatest annual or biennial art ...

and, especially, at the Salon de Mulhouse, which took place 16 times between 1836 and 1912 (in 1899, Camille Pissarro,

Claude Monet Oscar-Claude Monet (, , ; 14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926) was a French painter and founder of impressionist painting who is seen as a key precursor to modernism, especially in his attempts to paint nature as he perceived it. During ...

, and

Pierre-Auguste Renoir Pierre-Auguste Renoir (; 25 February 1841 – 3 December 1919) was a French artist who was a leading painter in the development of the Impressionist style. As a celebrator of beauty and especially feminine sensuality, it has been said that "R ...

participated in the Salon de Mulhouse with two paintings each, none of which was purchased by the SIM. Monet and Renoir did the same again in 1908, with the same result.) The main focus of the collection is French art from (roughly) 1830 to 1930, with Alsatian painters active in France, such as

Jean-Jacques Henner Jean-Jacques Henner (5 March 1829 – 23 July 1905) was a French painter, noted for his use of sfumato and chiaroscuro in painting nudes, religious subjects and portraits. Biography Henner was born at Bernwiller (Alsace). He began his studies ...

(of whom the museum owns 44 oil paintings), Jean Benner, Emmanuel Benner, Camille Alfred Pabst,

Gustave Brion Gustave Brion (1824–1877) was a French painter and illustrator. He was born at Rothau in the department of Bas-Rhin on 24 October 1824. In 1841, in Strasbourg, he entered the studio of Gabriel Guérin, with whom he remained three years; ...

, Marcel Rieder, Henri Zuber, Charles Walch... sharing the walls with

Courbet Jean Désiré Gustave Courbet ( , , ; 10 June 1819 – 31 December 1877) was a French painter who led the Realism movement in 19th-century French painting. Committed to painting only what he could see, he rejected academic convention and t ...

, Isabey,

Boudin Boudin () are various kinds of sausage in French, Luxembourgish, Belgian, Swiss, Québécois, Acadian, Aostan, Louisiana Creole, and Cajun cuisine. Etymology The Anglo-Norman word meant 'sausage', 'blood sausage' or 'entrails' in general. ...

, Bonnat,

Martin Martin may refer to: Places * Martin City (disambiguation) * Martin County (disambiguation) * Martin Township (disambiguation) Antarctica * Martin Peninsula, Marie Byrd Land * Port Martin, Adelie Land * Point Martin, South Orkney Islands Austr ...

, Cormon,

Clairin Clairin (, , ht, Kleren) is a distilled alcoholic spirit made from sugarcane produced in Haiti, that undergoes the same distillation process as rhum. There are between 500 and 600 micro-distilleries in Haiti, compared to fewer than 50 in total ...

, Laurens,

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, Merson, Marquet, and many others. The museum also displays a small collection of old master paintings featuring artists from

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...

( Sebastiano Ricci), the

Dutch Republic The United Provinces of the Netherlands, also known as the (Seven) United Provinces, officially as the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands (Dutch: ''Republiek der Zeven Verenigde Nederlanden''), and commonly referred to in historiography ...

(

Jacob van Ruisdael Jacob Isaackszoon van Ruisdael (; 1629 – 10 March 1682) was a Dutch painter, draughtsman, and etcher. He is generally considered the pre-eminent landscape painter of the Dutch Golden Age, a period of great wealth and cultural ach ...

), and

Flanders Flanders (, ; Dutch: ''Vlaanderen'' ) is the Flemish-speaking northern portion of Belgium and one of the communities, regions and language areas of Belgium. However, there are several overlapping definitions, including ones related to culture, ...

(

Pieter Brueghel the Younger Pieter Brueghel (also Bruegel or Breughel) the Younger (, ; ; between 23 May and 10 October 1564 – between March and May 1638) was a Flemish painter, known for numerous copies after his father Pieter Bruegel the Elder's work as well as h ...

David Teniers the Younger David Teniers the Younger or David Teniers II (bapt. 15 December 1610 – 25 April 1690) was a Flemish Baroque painter, printmaker, draughtsman, miniaturist painter, staffage painter, copyist and art curator. He was an extremely versatile arti ...

) in addition to French masters (

Hyacinthe Rigaud Jacint Rigau-Ros i Serra (; 18 July 1659 – 29 December 1743), known in French as Hyacinthe Rigaud (), was a Catalan-French baroque painter most famous for his portraits of Louis XIV and other members of the French nobility. Biography Rigaud ...

, François Boucher); a small collection of

medieval In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the Post-classical, post-classical period of World history (field), global history. It began with t ...

Germanic paintings and sculptures (on loan from the Musée historique de Mulhouse); and post-

WWII World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

art, essentially from France (

Aurélie Nemours Aurélie Nemours (29 October 1910 – 27 January 2005) was a French Painting, painter who made geometric abstraction, abstract geometrical paintings and was highly influenced by De Stijl, or neoplasticism. Biography Aurélie Nemours was born ...

Gallery of notable works

See also: Paintings in the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Mulhouse Jacob van Ruisdael, Entrée de Forêt.jpg, ''Entrance to a Forest'' (Jacob van Ruisdael) Boucher, Le Jugement de Pâris.jpg, ''The Judgement of Paris'' (François Boucher) 1869 Jean-Jacques Henner - Woman on a black divan.jpg, ''Woman on a Black Divan'' (Jean-Jacques Henner) William-Adolphe Bouguereau (1825-1905) - Flora And Zephyr (1875) transparency.png, ''Flora and Zephyr'' (William Bouguereau) Emmanuel Benner, Habitation lacustre.jpg, ''Lakeside Dwelling'' (Emmanuel Benner) Francesco Francia, Vénus et Cupidon.jpg, ''Venus and Cupid'' (

Francesco Francia __NOTOC__ Francesco Francia, whose real name was Francesco Raibolini (1447 – 5 January 1517) was an Italian painter, goldsmith, and medallist from Bologna, who was also director of the city mint.Levinson:492 He may have trained with Marco Zop ...

) Luc-Olivier Merson, L’Arrivée à Béthléem.jpg, ''The Arrival at Bethlehem'' (

Luc-Olivier Merson Luc-Olivier Merson (21 May 1846 – 13 November 1920) was a French academic painter and illustrator also known for his postage stamp and currency designs. Biography Born Nicolas Luc-Olivier Merson in Paris, France, he grew up in an artist ...

) Laurens, L'attente.jpg, ''Waiting'' (

Jean-Paul Laurens Jean-Paul Laurens (; 28 March 1838 – 23 March 1921) was a French painter and sculptor, and one of the last major exponents of the French Academic style. Biography Laurens was born in Fourquevaux and was a pupil of Léon Cogniet and Alexa ...

) Albert Marquet, Le port de Rabat.jpg, ''The Harbour of Rabat'' ( Albert Marquet) La Belle Italienne.jpg, ''The Beautiful Italian Woman'' ( Georgette Agutte)

References

Bibliography

*Isabelle Dubois-Brinkmann: ''Musée des Beaux-Arts de Mulhouse. Œuvres choisies.'' I.D. l'Édition, November 2019. .

External links

{{Commonscat, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Mulhouse
Official websiteMusée des Beaux-Arts de Mulhouse (68)
on ''Musées Grand Est'' Museums established in 1864

Mulhouse