The new exhibition at the Cabinet des Dessins et Estampes - Jean Bonna in Beaux-Arts de Paris focuses on Michelangelo to explore the concepts of influence and transmission.
Michelangelo holds a special place in the pantheon of great artists: his work, unanimously admired and based on unprecedented originality, resists those who seek to find perfection in it.
In the 19th century, Michelangelo became an essential reference because he was the archetype of the 'artist-magician', according to Rodin's expression, who sought in his creations the mysterious springs of his own creativity.
After Michelangelo brings together some forty works – drawings, prints, photographs, sculptures – from collections that reveal the various ways in which the "divine" Michelangelo has been studied, copied, viewed or reinterpreted since the Renaissance, and particularly in the 19th century, by Géricault, Carpeaux and Rodin. The exhibition is enriched by works created for the exhibition by students of nine professors who have come together for this project: Pascale Accoyer, Claude Closky, Clément Cogitore, Frédérique Loutz, Jack McNiven, Guillaume Paris, Philippe Renault, Daniel Schlier and Valérie Sonnier.
The exhibition is accompanied by a catalogue and will be followed by an event from 9 to 11 April 2026, bringing together art historians, heritage specialists, students and professors from Beaux-Arts de Paris to discuss the reception of this immense figure of the Italian Renaissance in France.
CURATION
Alice Thomine-Berrada, Head of Collections at Beaux-Arts de Paris, and Estelle Lambert, Curator of Prints and Manuscripts at Beaux-Arts de Paris.
AMONG THE ARTISTS
Domenico del Barbiere, Guillaume Boichot, Léon Bonnat, Numa Boucoiran, Adolphe Braun, Jean Baptiste Carpeaux, Alphonse Chamson, Jacques Louis David, Étienne Delaune, Mathias Duval, Guillaume Duchenne de Boulogne, Jacques Édouard Gatteaux, Théodore Géricault, Alexandre Charles Guillemot, Hermann Heid, Louis Alexis Jamar, Paul Lepage, Charles Marville, Raffaele da Montelupo, Alphonse Antoine Montfort, Antoine Quatremère de Quincy, Joseph Théodore Richomme, Joseph Nicolas Robert-Fleury, Auguste Rodin, Martino Rota, Henri Joseph François de Triqueti, François Joseph Toussaint Uchard...
Visual credits: Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux, Étude d'après un détail du plafond de la Chapelle Sixtine de Michel-Ange, XIXe siècle, plume et encre brune sur papier, 11,5 x 18,7 cm © Beaux-Arts de Paris / Théodore Géricault, Étude d'après les figures des tombeaux des Médicis de Michel-Ange, mine de plomb et plume, encre brune sur papier beige, 23 x 28,1 cm © Beaux-Arts de Paris
