Taking a photo of the “Mona Lisa” at the Louvre Museum has long been similar to a competitive sport, requiring the agility of a gymnast and the endurance of a marathon runner. As Olympic fever sweeps Paris, the city's cultural heavyweight gears up and dons its best athletic gear for a full season of sports programming.
The main sporting activity is “Run in the Louvre”, hour-long sweat sessions in which 30 visitors participate in four 10-minute exercises in the museum's most emblematic spaces. Yoga mats and lockers are provided.
The circuit starts with yoga in Cour Marly and Cour Puget. The courtyard is filled with sculptures that once adorned King Louis XIV's castle. Various inspiring poses. To balance it out, there's the one-sided slant of Daphne running away from Apollo, sculpted by Nicolas Coustou. For a torso twist, Philippe Magnier's brilliant “Wretlers” offer two possibilities. For total relaxation, try Edme Bouchardon's expansive “Sleeping Faun.”
Next comes a dance session – dancehall, to be specific – in the Khorsabad courtyard. The Jamaican musical tradition has its roots in reggae, and the stone ornaments of the 8th-century BC Assyrian palace make for a very suitable location, as both Assyria and dancehall share a dislike for Babylon. The tour continues with a nightclub in the Salle des Cariatides, once a royal ballroom and named after the four imposing female figures that support the musicians' gallery. The Renaissance palace was King Francis' response to the splendor of the palaces he found in Italy at the beginning of the 16th century. It replaced a medieval structure and “Run the Louvre” traces this lineage by ending with some aerobic exercise at the foot of the ancient castle walls.
Until the end of May, tours begin before the museum opens to the public each day and were designed by choreographer and dancer Mehdi Kerkouche. It is far from being the only sporting venture carried out at the Louvre. As the museum's director, Laurence des Cars, recently highlighted, the Louvre is in the heart of Paris and will be at the center of the Olympic Games.
This year marks the third time that Paris has hosted the Olympic Games – the last time was in 1924 – and the Louvre explores this history with an exhibition opening earlier this spring, “Olympism: Modern Invention, Ancient Legacy”. The exhibition, which runs until September 16, brings together artefacts, ancient and modern, to show how turn-of-the-century organizers reinvented a lost Greek tradition. A ritual adapted from ancient Greece was the Olympic flame and its contemporary equivalent will be held in the halls of the Louvre on July 14, two weeks before the opening ceremony. The Olympic marathon and road cycling competitions will take place at the most visited art museum in the world.
Another Louvre landmark celebrating the 33rd Olympic Games? It increased ticket prices to 22 euros, an increase of 29 percent.
Source: Artnet News