The Paris School of Fine Arts sits in the 6th arrondissement, between Rue Bonaparte and Quai Malaquais, and despite its historical importance, it isn’t considered a major tourist attraction.
Part of the reason may be that it’s an active school, so a lot of travelers assume, quite reasonably, that only art students and professors are allowed inside. But that’s a mistake: you can absolutely visit, though as you’ll see later in this article, it isn’t always easy. Whoever manages to get in is rewarded with a gorgeous complex that includes an old chapel, several striking buildings and no shortage of artwork.
A few years ago, thanks to a temporary exhibition held in the school’s main building, I managed to get inside. I was blown away by the artistic and architectural richness of the place and fell in love with it instantly. I wandered as if hypnotized among the sculptures and artworks, stepped into a few of the rooms and courtyards, and really didn’t want to leave. Ever since, it’s become one of my favorite spots in Paris, and I hope that by the end of this article, you’ll fall for it too.
To convince you to add the School of Fine Arts to your next trip to Paris, let me take you on a short journey through its fascinating history. Along the way, we’ll uncover a beautiful, little-known palace that once stood here, the story of the most important artists who worked in the place, and of course we won’t forget to say a little about the bohemian life that was born in the streets nearby.
Grab your beret, it’s time, pull out your brush and your palette from the closet, and let’s get going!
The history of the Paris School of Fine Arts
Queen Margot’s palace
Marguerite de Valois (1553-1615), better known to us as “Queen Margot,” was forced to marry Henri de Navarre (the future King Henri IV of France, r. 1589-1610) in an attempt to make peace between Catholics and Protestants in France (the plan didn’t work out so well, as you can tell from the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre that took place shortly after their wedding).
If you don’t know the fascinating story of Marguerite de Valois’s life, I highly recommend watching the film “La Reine Margot,” starring Isabelle Adjani. Here’s the trailer for this beautiful film, which was re-released in a special 4K edition in 2014.
Over the following years, Henri and Marguerite lived apart, each carrying on affairs with various lovers. But in 1589, things changed. Henri de Navarre became King Henri IV (r. 1589-1610), and as king, he needed to produce an heir to avoid a political vacuum after his death. Since his lawful wife couldn’t bear children, the fresh new king had no choice but to divorce her.
Queen Margot took advantage of the fact that the Catholic faith, which the king had been forced to adopt (“Paris is worth a Mass”), didn’t allow for an easy divorce, and so she negotiated hard with the king. After lengthy discussions, Margot agreed to divorce Henri IV, and in exchange received a very large sum of money and the right to keep the title of queen, even after the king remarried. This created a one-of-a-kind situation in French history: between 1600 and 1615, France had two queens at once.
With a large sum of money in hand and the title of queen, Margot decided to build a palace worthy of her station, where she could spend the rest of her days in comfort. For this, she chose a large plot of land on the Left Bank, which belonged to the University of Paris and stood across from the Louvre Palace.
If we were to map out the palace grounds as they once stood, the northern border was the Seine, the eastern border was the Tour de Nesle (where the Institut de France building and the Pont des Arts stand today), the western border was Rue des Saints-Pères, and the southern border was, more or less, the Saint-Germain-des-Prés abbey.
While the palace was being built, the queen moved between several residences, the most famous of which was the Hôtel de Sens. During her stay there, a dreadful thing happened to the queen: one of her former lovers murdered her current one. If you want to read more about this tragic story, I highly recommend the article Queen Margot and Her Unlucky Lovers.
But eventually, construction finished and the queen was able to move into her permanent home. And what a home it was!
Sadly, no illustrated records of this palace survive, aside from the map you see above. But according to the accounts of those who lived in the 17th century, it was one of the most beautiful palaces in Paris. Fortunately, one impressive chapel survives from the palace (which you can visit, as we’ll see later), and it was part of a monastery the queen built on her palace grounds.
The monastery was given to the order of the “Barefoot Augustinians” (Augustins Déchaussés), who were asked to sing hymns every day in honor of the patriarch Jacob, which the queen herself had composed. But musical talent apparently wasn’t among the required qualities for joining this order, and after five years of constant off-key singing, the Barefoot Augustinians were dismissed and replaced by the “Petits-Augustins” (Les Petits Augustins). These managed to sing the queen’s hymns without going flat, and stayed in the place until the French Revolution. That’s why one of the streets in the area is named after them.
But without a doubt, the crown jewel of the royal complex was its magnificent gardens, which were opened to the general public, making Queen Margot extremely popular. Her popularity was a thorn in the side of Marie de Médicis (1575-1642), King Henri IV’s new wife, and in response, she created the Cour de la Reine on the Right Bank, across the river (you can read about this garden in my article on the Tuileries Garden).
By the way, Marie de Médicis didn’t stop at creating royal gardens open to the public: she also wanted an even grander new palace than Queen Margot’s. The result, of course, is the Luxembourg Palace and its beautiful gardens, which you can read about in The Luxembourg Gardens: A Walking Tour of Paris’s Most Beloved Garden.
The Academy of Fine Arts looks for a home
After Queen Margot’s death, her palace passed to King Louis XIII (r. 1610-1643). But along with the palace, the king inherited her enormous debts, and he was forced to sell off the royal complex to cover them. As a result, the palace was demolished and Rue de Seine was built in its place, while the gardens gave way to houses and additional streets. Luckily, not everything was lost, and part of the complex remained as it was until the 19th century, when it became home to the Academy of Fine Arts.
Before we continue the story, let me say a few words about that academy and tell you how it came to be.
The Academy of Painting and Sculpture, the predecessor of today’s Academy of Fine Arts, was founded in 1648 by the painter Charles Le Brun (1619-1680), whom Louis XIV called “the greatest painter of all time.” Its goal was to address both the theory and the practice of these arts, and to train a new generation of talented artists.
One way the academy did this was by awarding prizes to especially talented students, the most important of which was the Prix de Rome. This prize allowed students to study in Rome for about a year, exposing them to the great masters of the Renaissance and the Baroque. Over the course of its history, the prize went to quite a few famous painters and architects, such as the celebrated Rococo painter François Boucher (1703-1770), his student Jacques-Louis David (1748-1825), the architect Charles Garnier (1825-1898), known to us for the Palais Garnier, and many others.
Eventually, it was decided to merge the academies of sculpture, painting and architecture into a single academy, creating the “Académie des Beaux-Arts,” which taught all these disciplines together. A school this prestigious needed an equally prestigious home, and so, after spending a few years in the building of the Collège des Quatre-Nations (today the Institut de France), it was decided to take the monastery Queen Margot had built and turn it into the School of Fine Arts.
This school moved into its new home in 1816, and between 1819 and 1829, its main building was constructed in a Neo-Renaissance style. In 1883, the School of Fine Arts expanded and annexed several neighboring mansions, the most famous of which is the Hôtel de Chimay. That’s how, by the late 19th century, the School of Fine Arts took on its final shape.
The result is a stunning Renaissance-style building, alongside which you’ll find several palace fragments and statues, rescued long ago from palaces that were torn down. We’ll talk more about that in the section on visiting the place, but first, let me tell you a bit about the artists who studied and taught there, some of whom became among the greatest artists France has ever produced.
Examples of artists who studied at this prestigious institution include the painters Antoine Watteau (1684-1721), Eugène Delacroix (1803-1869), Edgar Degas (1834-1917) and many others. But great artists didn’t only study at the academy, they also taught there, and one of the most famous was Henri Matisse (1869-1954), who demanded that his students push past the boundaries of art and express their inner truth.
Somewhat surprisingly, and unlike the Académie française, the Academy of Fine Arts admitted women to its ranks as early as the 17th century. The most famous painter among them was Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun (1755-1842), whose fascinating life you can read about in Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun: The Painter Who Fought for Marie Antoinette’s Image.
Even into the 20th century, a place at the academy remained a dream for many, and a few non-French artists were admitted as well. The most famous of them were the director and actor Orson Welles (1915-1985) and the actor Peter Ustinov (1921-2004), who took his seat after Welles’s death (in my opinion, Ustinov played Hercule Poirot better than anyone else, though that’s definitely up for debate and has nothing to do with this article).
La Bohème
While the academy’s members lived comfortable lives, the fate of the students was entirely different. They had to live in cheap hotels in the 6th arrondissement and often went hungry.
The poet and writer Henri Murger (1822-1861) captured the lives of these students best in his book “Scènes de la vie de bohème.” The book is a collection of stories about student life in Paris in the first half of the 19th century, and from it you can see just how poor they were.
One example is found in the story of a Christmas Eve celebrated by Rodolphe and Marcel in a shabby hotel room, where they discover that the cheap tree they bought with their last few coins won’t catch fire to warm them.
Another famous story about these students’ lives involves a visit to the cheap restaurant on Rue du Four (not far from the Saint-Germain-des-Prés church). As the story reveals, the students left this restaurant, where the meal cost 3 centimes, hungrier than when they arrived…
Murger’s book wasn’t a great success at first, but once his stories were adapted into a play, they became hugely popular. His work reached the height of its popularity after Puccini used it as the basis for his opera “La Bohème,” and that’s how the word “bohemian” became synonymous with a talented but poor young artist. Murger himself summed up bohemian life well, in his immortal line:
Bohemian life is the artist’s apprenticeship. It is the preface to the Academy, to the Hôtel-Dieu (the hospital where the poor of Paris were treated), or to the grave.
The Saint-Germain district becomes the gallery district
The Paris School of Fine Arts’s location in Saint-Germain meant that over the years, the surrounding streets, especially Rue de Seine and Rue des Beaux-Arts, filled up with dozens upon dozens of art galleries.
One of the most famous galleries is that of Albert Loeb, still located near the School of Fine Arts at 12 Rue des Beaux-Arts to this day. The founder’s father was one of the most prominent art dealers in Paris before World War I, and sold the works of some of the most famous modern painters, including André Derain (1880-1951). That’s why even today you can find similar works there at prices that would require you to sell the shirt off your back (not recommended, since it can get pretty cold in Paris).
Other important galleries that have survived to this day include that of Claude Bernard, at number 9 on the same street, where works by Alberto Giacometti (1901-1966) and David Hockney (b. 1937) have been sold. Alternatively, at number 4, Patrice Trigano’s gallery still sells no shortage of artwork created in the 1950s (can what was created in the 1950s really be called art? I won’t get into that debate, tempting as it is).
Of course, if modern art isn’t your cup of tea, these galleries will interest you less. But I still highly recommend walking the streets around the Paris School of Fine Arts anyway, since you’ll find not just modern galleries there, but also no shortage of antique furniture shops and secondhand bookstores. The prices there, too, are usually astronomical, but looking is free, right?
The Paris School of Fine Arts: Visitor information
Now that we’ve covered a bit of the history of the School of Fine Arts, it’s time to go visit the place. In this part of the article, you’ll find all the information you need for your visit, plus a few of my recommendations for where to stay in the area.
Where is the School of Fine Arts in Paris and how do you get there?
The entrance to the Paris School of Fine Arts is at 14 Rue Bonaparte. In my opinion, the fastest way to get there is by metro, since several stations are a short walk away. Here are your two best options:
- Take line 4, get off at Saint-Germain-des-Prés, and walk north on Rue Bonaparte.
- Take line 1, get off at Louvre-Rivoli, cross the Pont des Arts, and walk west until you reach the intersection with Rue Bonaparte.
If you’d rather get there by bus, you can take lines 27, 87, N12 or N13 and get off near the Pont des Arts, then continue on foot for just a few steps.
How much does it cost to visit the School of Fine Arts, and when can you go?
Let’s start with the good news: admission to the School of Fine Arts is free. The less good news is that the only way to get in, unless there happens to be a temporary exhibition open to the public, is through a guided tour in French. To check when such a tour is scheduled, you need to call 01.47.03.50.63.
It’s true, getting into the School of Fine Arts takes some advance planning and a bit of luck, but as you’ll see, it’s definitely worth the effort.
What should you make a point of seeing?
Queen Margot’s chapel
Once you pass the guard’s post, look to your right and you’ll see the beautiful facade of a 16th-century church. Take a closer look and you’ll spot the letters H and DD. These are the emblems of King Henri II of France (r. 1547-1559) and his legendary mistress Diane de Poitiers (1500-1566). What are they doing here? You might well ask.
The church facade was brought here from the Château d’Anet, Diane de Poitiers’s home, and it once belonged to an older church that stood there. Step inside, and you’ll discover the place hasn’t functioned as a church for a very long time: it’s now a museum where you can find copies of some of the greatest works in the history of art, including Michelangelo’s famous fresco “The Last Judgment.”
After you finish looking at the various paintings and sculptures, step into the small chapel that survives from Queen Margot’s day. It’s called La Chapelle des Louanges, and it’s the first chapel in Paris to be decorated with a dome, which gives it its importance in the architectural history of the City of Light (by the way, the first church in Paris to feature a dome was Notre-Dame-des-Anges, which you can read about in the walking tour in the footsteps of Madame de Sévigné).
The main building
Once you’ve finished visiting the chapel, head out to the courtyard and into the Neo-Renaissance building on its western side. There you’ll find the school’s offices, most of which are closed to the public. But the main attraction of this building is the magnificent hall, mostly used for rotating exhibitions.
It’s a stunning hall that combines a somewhat modern glass-and-metal dome with paintings of historical figures from the Renaissance, such as King Francis I (r. 1515-1547), alongside copies of works by important Renaissance artists, such as Raphael (Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino, 1483-1520).
If you’re allowed to continue further, you can also enter the magnificent amphitheater attached to this hall. It’s where the institution’s board meetings are held, and where the Prix de Rome, which I mentioned earlier, is awarded. Look for the stunning fresco on the wall, which depicts all the great artists from ancient Greece through the 19th century.
Cour du Mûrier (Mulberry Courtyard)
This courtyard is named for the mulberry tree planted here by Alexandre Lenoir (1761-1839), director of the Museum of French Monuments, which stood here before the site became a school of fine arts.
This was the cloister (covered courtyard) of the monastery Queen Margot built, and today you’ll find a well and a row of ancient statues here. A few years ago, the place underwent a thorough renovation, and the result, as you’ll see in the video above and the photo below, is simply stunning.
Hôtel de Chimay
This magnificent mansion was built during the 17th century, in part by the famous architect François Mansart (1598-1666), uncle of the even more famous architect Jules Hardouin-Mansart (1646-1708), who was responsible, among other things, for Les Invalides. The mansion still contains several paintings by Charles Le Brun, and it passed through several owners before it was purchased in 1883 by the management of the Paris School of Fine Arts.
In the mansion’s courtyard, you’ll find several statues, but in my opinion the most interesting pieces are the surviving fragments of the Tuileries Palace, including this beautiful column, which you can see in the photo below.
Finished visiting the École des Beaux-Arts?
I hope you enjoyed the tour of the School of Fine Arts. If you’re looking for what else to do nearby, you have two pretty good options.
- The first option is to keep exploring the 6th arrondissement and discover its secrets. I put together the article Attractions in the 6th arrondissement just for this, where you’ll find not only interesting spots but also links to walking routes and other important travel information.
- Another option is to cross to the Right Bank of the Seine and explore the 1st arrondissement. For that, check out the article Attractions in the 1st arrondissement.
Recommended places to stay near the Paris School of Fine Arts
The location of the Paris School of Fine Arts is simply wonderful. The picturesque streets, the galleries, the beauty peeking out of every alley, combined with a central spot that lets you hop easily between the Left Bank and the Right Bank. So if you’d like to stay nearby, here are a few recommended hotels (though not cheap):
A few steps further, you’ll find the three-star Hotel d’Angleterre, with prices that make sense (relative to the location, anyway). If all these hotels are booked or too pricey, I invite you to check out the article Recommended hotels in the 6th arrondissement.
If you’re looking to rent a vacation apartment in the area instead of a hotel, you can do that through the article on recommended vacation apartments in this arrondissement.
Did your visit to the École des Beaux-Arts leave you hungry?
Don’t worry! Unlike the poor students who studied here in the 19th century, you won’t starve, since just south of the School of Fine Arts, toward Saint-Germain-des-Prés, there are plenty of excellent restaurants. You can find information about them in Recommended restaurants in the 6th arrondissement.
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