Touching color. The renewal of pastel

The pastel in front of the venerable oil painting. Why some artists of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries opted for the pastel and claimed it? This exhibition is not intended to be exhaustive but it does try to answer the question posed from an international perspective. Organized in 10 sections, it focuses on the key moments of the pastel revival and the most important painters. "Touching color. The renewal of pastel" consists of 98 works by 68 artists and has been possible thanks to the support of more than seventy providers, both institutions and private collectors.

And finally: the Pastellists (Pastel Painters)

In the 1830s the term "pastellist" appears. The technique of the pastel knew in the eighteenth century a great boom, but did not reach the legitimacy of oil. There were several causes: typesetting in the genre of the portrait (much less valued than the representation of historical or religious facts), its appropriation by numerous women, and the use of the pastel to make sketches, which tended to confuse it with graphic arts. However, artists such as Eugène Boudin, Odilon Redon or Edgar Degas, who opted for pastel, gave this technique a higher status. The new position was maintained throughout the first half of the twentieth century with the breakdown of languages ​​that opened the subsequent generation: Pablo Picasso, Joan Miró, María Blanchard or Theo van Doesburg.

Opening hours

• Monday from 2:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m.
• Tuesday to Saturday from 10:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m.
• Sundays / holidays from 11:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m.

Closed: December 25, January 1 and 6.
Special schedule: December 24 and 31 from 10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.
Holidays open: October 12, November 1, December 6, 8 and 26.

Free admission every Monday from 2 pm to 8 pm.