The best new exhibitions in Paris
Zurbarán at the Louvre, Mary Cassatt at the Musée d'Orsay, photography at the Bourse de Commerce, Gustave Fayet at the Fondation Louis Vuitton, Schwitters at the Musée Picasso, and Belmondo at the Cinémathèque. They join Monet at the Orangerie, Warhol at the Musée du Luxembourg, and Cézanne at the Grand Palais. That's all that's just opened in Paris.
ZURBARÁN AT THE LOUVRE MUSEUM The Louvre is going Spanish. The major retrospective devoted to Francisco de Zurbarán, master of the Golden Age, unfolds his isolated figures, his white fabrics, and his silences, while Sculpting Color opens concurrently. From October 9 to 18, the season “I Louvre mucho!” " adds concerts, film screenings, and a carte blanche for Rossy de Palma.
REMEMBER ME AT THE EXCHANGE The Pinault Collection entrusts its walls to photography and chooses portraiture as its central theme, from the rediscovered anonymous individual to the overexposed star. The faces line up, size each other up, and ultimately compose a gallery of ghosts." Beneath the rotunda, the installation is understated, allowing each viewer to occupy all the space they desire.
BOURSE DE COMMERCE - PINAULT COLLECTION
From October 7, 2026 to January 18, 2027
GUSTAVE FAYET AT THE LOUIS VUITTON FOUNDATION An industrialist from the Aude region and a painter himself, Gustave Fayet bought Gauguin and Redon when no one else wanted them, and transformed an abbey into a complete studio. The Louis Vuitton Foundation brings together what his eye had discerned, and the exhibition is as valuable for the paintings as it is for the portrait of a collector who created through collecting.
MARY CASSATT, THE INDEPENDENT, AT THE MUSÉE D'ORSAY
An American in Paris, Mary Cassatt exhibited with the Impressionists, yet rejected their landscapes: she painted dressing rooms, children bathing, women reading, and busy hands. The Musée d'Orsay is offering her a retrospective that finally corrects the label of "painter of motherhood" and reveals a formidable technician.
MUSÉE D'ORSAY
From October 6, 2026 to January 31, 2027
KURT SCHWITTERS, THE CHAOS-WORLD, AT THE MUSÉE PICASSO
Tram tickets, packaging, bits of string: Schwitters spent thirty years piecing the world back together with its waste and named the company Merz. The Picasso Museum follows this trajectory from Weimar Germany to his English exile, and the predicted chaos reveals itself with a geometric rigor, almost tender.
PICASSO NATIONAL MUSEUM-PARIS
From October 6, 2026 to February 7, 2027
BELMONDO, THE MAGNIFICENT, AT THE FRENCH FILM THEATRE The Cinémathèque is bringing out contracts, set photos, unstunt footage, and role rejections. Behind the smile and the Parisian rooftops emerges an actor who produced his own films and negotiated his image. The exhibition avoids hagiography and reveals a craft, which is more moving than a tribute.
MONET, PAINTING TIME, AT THE ORANGERY MUSEUM Here, Monet is at home: the two oval rooms have housed the Large Decorations since 1927. For the centenary of his death, the Orangerie revisits the obsession that permeated all his painting: time. Forty canvases, from series to snapshots, where the same haystack and the same cathedral change from hour to hour, from mist to full sunlight.
STREET ART DENFERT, IN THE FORMER ZARA DE DENFERT-ROCHEREAU The exhibition was scheduled to run for ten days in the crypt of the Madeleine. It finally takes up residence for three weeks in a 2,400 m² space spread over three levels, in a former Zara store whose windows face Avenue du Général-Leclerc. Around one hundred artists are giving back to painting an empty commercial space, and entry remains free with registration.
STREET ART DENFERT
From October 3 to 25, 2026
TALISMAN, ALI BANISADR AT THE GUSTAVE MOREAU MUSEUM
Ali Banisadr hangs his teeming crowds in Gustave Moreau's studio, and the gamble pays off: the same taste for teeming life, the same rejection of the clear scene. Contemporary canvases slip between the overloaded walls of the Symbolist master, in this spiral staircase that feels like a set piece, and it becomes difficult to tell who is quoting whom.
GUSTAVE MOREAU NATIONAL MUSEUM
From September 9 to December 7, 2026
ARTISTS AT THE MUSEUM IN THE GREAT GALLERY OF EVOLUTION
Delacroix and Gustave Moreau used to come here to draw wild animals without leaving Paris. For its four hundredth anniversary, the Museum is showcasing three hundred works and four centuries of artists' perspectives on science: painted vellum drawings for Gaston d'Orléans, a polar bear by François Pompon, photographs by Robert Doisneau.
NATIONAL MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY
From September 23, 2026 to March 7, 2027
SOFIA COPPOLA'S MARIE ANTOINETTE AT THE PETIT TRIANON
Twenty years after filming, the pastel dresses and high heels return to where the camera captured them. Oscar-winning costumes by Milena Canonero, storyboards, annotated scripts, set photographs, and projections of scenes in the very rooms where they were filmed: the Petit Trianon is seen through the lens of Sofia Coppola.
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Palace of Versailles, Petit Trianon
From September 22, 2026 to January 24, 2021 2027[/compact]
HASSAN HAJJAJ, MY ROCK STARS, AT THE MUSIC MUSEUM
Rachid Taha, Alicia Keys, Lee "Scratch" Perry: Hassan Hajjaj photographs his idols in Nike slippers and pop sunglasses, in tin can frames, under the light of Marrakech or London. The Philharmonie is dedicating an exhibition to the man Taha nicknamed Andy Wahloo. Around forty portraits, with a soundtrack by Acid Arab.
MUSIQUE DE LA MUSIQUE - PHILHARMONIE DE PARIS
From September 22, 2026 to April 25, 2027
MINUSCLE LIVES AT THE PANTHEON
Under the dome reserved for great men, the Centre Pompidou and the Centre des Monuments Nationaux present these minuscule lives. Three words for three rooms: the infinitesimal, that inframince so dear to Marcel Duchamp, the intimate, the infamous. The title comes from Pierre Michon, who in 1984 dedicated eight portraits to unknown people and figures from his circle.
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PANTHEON
From September 25, 2026 to January 31, 2027
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From September 25, 2026 to January 31, 2027
Landscape Stories at the Marmottan Monet Museum
From 1893 to the present day, the landscape ceases to be a backdrop and becomes a witness. The Marmottan Museum brings Monet and Hockney into dialogue across a century, revealing what trees and skies record of wars, industry, and climate. The museum could have simply focused on its Water Lilies for the anniversary, but it chose to look beyond them.
MARMOTTAN MONET MUSEUM
From September 24, 2026 to January 31, 2021 2027
CEZANNE AND US AT THE GRAND PALAIS The title poses the question in the right way: not what Cezanne owes to his era, but what ours still owes him. The Grand Palais follows the path left by a painter who retired to Aix and who had stopped seeking to exhibit, first with those who saw him first, Gauguin and then Matisse, and with all the others after them.
LADY LIBERTÉ AT THE MUSÉE DES ARTS ET MÉTIERS The statue was initially a Parisian construction project and an engineering challenge: how to hold three hundred hand-hammered copper plates onto an iron frame, then dismantle the entire structure for shipping. The Musée des Arts et Métiers recounts this creation, with headphones on, in conjunction with the Bartholdi exhibition at the Musée d'Orsay.
ANIMAL STORIES AT THE BNF RICHELIEU
For humans, animals are as much dreamed of as observed. This is the story that the BnF museum unfolds in the Mazarin Gallery, under the title Animal Stories. Manuscripts, prints, musical scores, watercolors: a whole menagerie of paper works emerges from the reserves. Zoos are rare where one enters through a gallery from the Grand Siècle (17th century).
BNF RICHELIEU
From September 18, 2026 to August 29, 2027
KERRY JAMES MARSHALL, THE HISTORIES, AT THE MUSÉE D'ART MODERNE DE PARIS The Musée d’Art Moderne de Paris is dedicating its first French retrospective to Kerry James Marshall, bringing together seventy works, including eight new pieces created specifically for Paris. He depicts an America forged by violence using the conventions of European painting. The history of the Atlantic slave trade, civil rights, and Black Power are central to his artistic language.
MUSÉE D’ART MODERNE DE PARIS
From September 18, 2026 to January 24, 2027
ANDY WARHOL AT THE MUSÉE DU LUXEMBOURG
His first self-portrait dates from 1942, when he was fourteen; his last drawing from 1986, a year before his death. Between the two, Andy Warhol never stopped drawing. It is this foundational line, overshadowed by the Marilyn Monroes and Campbell's cheese boxes, that the Musée du Luxembourg is bringing back to the forefront, with one hundred and fifty drawings.
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MUSÉE DU LUXEMBOURG
From September 16, 2026 to January 10, 2021 2027[/compact]
TROMPE-L'ŒIL IN KOREA AT THE GUIMET MUSEUM Books stacked to the ceiling, scrolls, brushes, a vase, a pair of glasses: on these Korean folding screens, everything is painted and nothing exists. The Guimet Museum is dedicating an exhibition to chaekgeori, the trompe-l'œil library, a pictorial movement that reigned for two centuries in Korea and which France almost entirely ignores.
EVA GONZALÈS AT THE PETIT PALAIS
It took nearly 140 years for her work to be viewed from a perspective other than that of her mentor. The Petit Palais brings together paintings, drawings, prints, and archives, revealing a painter who chose her subjects and her style without ever copying Manet, in a century that offered her little opportunity.
PETIT PALAIS
From September 15, 2026 to January 24, 2027
AUGUSTE BARTHOLDI AT THE MUSÉE D'ORSAY To bring Lady Liberty into the world's imagination, it took an obsessive Alsatian, an iron engineer, and three hundred copper plates hammered by hand on rue de Chazelles. One hundred and forty years after its New York inauguration, the Musée d'Orsay recounts Bartholdi's dream and Eiffel's feat.
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MUSÉE D'ORSAY
From September 15, 2026 to January 31, 2027
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THE LOUVRE'S GUESTS, KADER ATTIA AND ELIZABETH PEYTON
The palace housed its artists for nearly two centuries, before Napoleon expelled them. The Louvre is reopening its doors to two of them, Kader Attia and Elizabeth Peyton, who are artists-in-residence within its walls. Creating on-site rather than depositing a finished work: what the museum is rediscovering is its studio-like state.
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From September 24 to December 14 2026[/compact]
NADAR, INVENTING PARIS, IN THE CATACOMBS
He photographed Baudelaire, Victor Hugo, and Sarah Bernhardt, then he ascended in a balloon to bring back, in 1858, the first aerial photograph in history. Three years later, he lowered his cameras into the quarries. The Catacombs exhibit Nadar twenty meters underground, in the galleries he was the first to illuminate.
CATACOMBS OF PARIS
From September 29, 2026 to January 31, 2027
LOOK! 40 YEARS OF FASHION AT THE MUSEUM, AT THE MAD
Forty years, forty silhouettes. To celebrate its four decades, the Museum of Fashion Arts brings together its finest pieces in a grand couture ball in the heart of the nave. From Madeleine Vionnet to Yves Saint Laurent, from Christian Dior to Comme des Garçons, iconic silhouettes tell the story of how clothing became art.
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MAD PARIS
From September 30, 2026 to April 4, 2027
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PENN & FASHION AT THE EUROPEAN HOUSE OF PHOTOGRAPHY A neutral background, precise lighting, a commanding silhouette: Irving Penn never simply photographed a dress; he transformed it into architecture. The European House of Photography brings together sixty years of this vision, among the most decisive of the twentieth century, and reminds us that haute couture stands there like a monument.
EUROPEAN HOUSE OF PHOTOGRAPHY
From September 30, 2026 to January 17, 2021 2027
MARCEL DUCHAMP PRIZE: THE FOUR NOMINEES AT THE MUSEUM OF MODERN ART Four artists have been shortlisted, and one will receive the 2026 Marcel Duchamp Prize on October 22, during Paris Art Week. Before the announcement, the Museum of Modern Art is presenting the finalists of this 26th edition free of charge, including Joël Andrianomearisoa, who designed Madagascar's first pavilion at the Venice Biennale in 2019.
RAFAEL PAVAROTTI AT THE MUSEUM OF DECORATIVE ARTS
He grew up in Pará, deep in the Amazon rainforest, and taught himself photography at the age of twelve by stealing his father's camera. Twenty years later, Rafael Pavarotti was shooting the covers of British Vogue. Two hundred images, and a consistent approach from the start: to bring into the spotlight bodies that fashion rarely showcased.
MUSEUM OF DECORATIVE ARTS
From October 2, 2026 to May 2, 2027
FIRST NATIONS AT THE QUAI BRANLY MUSEUM
Without agriculture or writing, and yet sedentary, numerous, and hierarchical: along 1,800 kilometers of coastline, the First Nations of the American Northwest built societies of rare richness. Masts, masks, capes, and houses are presented like sculpted archives, where Corbeau reigns as creator and ancestor of the clans.
MUSÉE DU QUAI BRANLY - JACQUES CHIRAC
From September 29, 2026 to January 17, 2027
LONG LIVE THE BRIDE! AT THE ARAB WORLD INSTITUTE A Maghreb wedding dress sometimes weighs several kilos of gold, thread, and pearls, and is worn for only one day. The Arab World Institute brings together forty costumes from Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia, never before exhibited in France, and juxtaposes them with the work of twenty-seven contemporary artists who reinterpret the ritual in their own way, between heritage and self-affirmation.
ARAB WORLD INSTITUTE
From September 29, 2026 to February 28, 2027
A WARDROBE OF ONE'S OWN AT THE PALAIS GALLIERA
Before trousers, there was the battle of clothing: Galliera brings together the outfits of those who loosened the corset, rode horses, cycled, and worked. Reformed dresses, Amazonian costumes, workshop pieces—each silhouette tells the story of a hard-won freedom. The exhibition avoids easy activism and lets the seams speak for themselves.
PALAIS GALLIERA
From September 26, 2026 to February 14, 2027
CHATEAUBRIAND AND JULIETTE RÉCAMIER AT VALLÉE-AUX-LOUPS The first exhibition dedicated to their story, which began in 1817 at the bedside of the dying Madame de Staël and continued for thirty years. Letters, portraits, and personal belongings fill the house at Vallée-aux-Loups, and the place itself is everything: you can read the correspondence right where he wrote, among the trees he planted.
CHATEAUBRIAND'S HOUSE, VALLÉE-AUX-LOUPS
From October 2, 2026 to September 26, 2027
