At the start of this year, Looking Up Paris invites you to commemorate the inauguration of the Opéra Garnier, on 5 January 1875, by Marshal of France de Mac-Mahon, then President of the Republic, with great ceremony and attended by more than 2,000 guests. The project had been launched in 1860 at the request of Napoleon III, who wanted a more accessible and safer theatre, having escaped an attempt on his life two years earlier by the anarchist Orsini on his way to the Académie de Musique in rue Le Peletier. It is an architectural masterpiece, which marks the apotheosis of the Second Empire style. Charles Garnier demonstrated here how skilfully he handled eclecticism, reconciling styles, shapes and aesthetics from different periods, to which he added his personal penchant for baroque and polychromy. The style is unprecedented and in perfect harmony with the purpose of the building, whose exuberance and flamboyance of decoration echo the dreamlike character of the shows staged. It was until the 1970s the largest theatre in the world, and the works that crown it are also monumental, starting with Apollo surrounded by Poetry and Music: placed on the gable of the stage, facing Avenue de l'Opéra, the figurative group, 7.50 m high and weighing 13 tons, reaches a height of 72 m. Charles Garnier expressed his admiration for the sculptor Aimé Millet, who despite his small size (as shown in the photo where the sculptor can be seen barely reaching the knees of the statues), managed in 18 months to create a work of such dimensions. Four other remarkable figurative groups accompany Apollo: two Pegasus restrained by Fame sculpted in bronze by Eugène-Louis Lequesne symmetrically adorn the pediment of the stage house, and two groups, Harmony and Poetry, works in bronze entirely covered with gold leaf, by Charles Gumery, flank the side forebodies of the main facade. You will find more about this masterpiece, the outcome of an eventful journey, in our book Looking Up Paris, and if you are in Paris, go to Place de l'Opéra to discover the multitude of treasures that enliven its façades. Happy New Year to all!
Comments