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A Closer Look

Our "Closer Look" interactive multimedia modules allow you to see the details of an artwork through a magnifying glass, while commentaries and animations give you its historical and artistic background.

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A Closer Look

A closer look at a Romanesque Virgin

The "Enthroned Virgin" acquired by the Louvre in 1894 is one of the most remarkable from the center of France. After restoration work in 2005, the sculpture has recovered its original colors - which can be admired in this special file.

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La Vierge du chancelier Rolin - Vignette

A closer look at The Virgin and Child with Chancellor Rolin

The only painting by Van Eyck in the Louvre's collection, the Virgin and Child with Chancellor Rolin, reflects the reality of 15th century Flemish society which allied, with no apparent sense of contradiction, a marked taste for opulence to a highly spiritual life. This multimedia study allows you to enjoy the wealth of detail with which Van Eyck portrayed the rich Nicolas Rolin. A glossary explains in further detail some of the concepts referred to in the study.

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A closer look at an ebony cabinet

The ebony cabinet in the Musée du Louvre is one of the most beautiful and luxurious examples of the production of the Parisian "joiners in ebony" – the so-called "ebonists" – in the first half of the 17th century. This multimedia study invites you to discover the luxuriant decoration and lavishly colored elements behind the dark, somewhat austere facade of the cabinet.

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A closer look at Louis-François Bertin

In his portrait by Ingres, Monsieur Bertin, the founder of the newspaper Journal des Débats, embodies the thriving bourgeoisie of the 1830s. It took Ingres a lot of time and effort to find a pose which would convey a sense of power adequate to the press magnate.

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Psyché ranimée par le baiser de l'Amour - Vignette

A closer look at Psyche Revived by Cupid’s Kiss

In the Michelangelo Gallery at the Louvre, the visitors crowd around this idyllic image of a loving couple: a winged man and a swooning woman in a voluptuous embrace, their lips about to join in a kiss. Who are these beings whom eighteenth-century sculptor Canova chose to immortalize in marble? This multimedia feature invites you to take a closer look at this masterful composition as you listen to the story of Psyche and admire Canova’s virtuoso treatment of the marble.

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