For Free - Paris - page 92

Bastille & Eastern Paris Cinémathèque Française and others.
Latin Quarter Musée National du Moyen Âge, Musée National d'Histoire Naturelle, Institut
du Monde Arabe.
St-Germain & Les Invalides Musée d'Orsay, Musée Rodin and others.
Montparnasse & Southern Paris Fondation Cartier and others.
Public Art
Museums and galleries are not the sole repositories of art in Paris. Indeed, art is all around
you - from living walls (vertical gardens adorning apartment buildings) and yarn-bombed
traffic poles to whimsical cows parading down the Champs-Élysées and 'invader' tags (tiled
Space Invader-inspired creations) marking street corners. Enjoying art in Paris is simply a
matter of keeping your eyes open.
While the smaller, anonymous works are among the most interesting and unique, there
are plenty of big-name installations as well that have become destinations in their own right.
Niki de Saint Phalle and Jean Tinguely's playful Stravinsky Fountain - a collection of 16
colourful, animated sculptures based on the composer's oeuvre - is located next to the
Centre Pompidou. Daniel Buren's zebra-striped columns of varying heights at the Palais
Royal is another beloved Paris fixture; the installation was originally greeted with derision
but has since become an integral part of the historic site. Both the Jardin des Tuileries and
the Jardin du Luxembourg are dotted with dozens of sculptures that date from the 19th and
early 20th centuries; the Jardin des Tuileries also contains an area with more contemporary
works from the likes of Lichtenstein and Magdalena Abakanowicz.
Interestingly, one of the best areas to go hunting for contemporary public art - and archi-
tecture - is out in the business district of La Défense, where you'll find some 60 works by
well-known artists such as Miró, Calder and Belmondo. Metro stations, too, often contain
some iconic or unusual additions, from Hector Guimard's signature art nouveau entrances to
the crown-shaped cupolas at the Palais Royal.