Pondering free access to French museums
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Photo: Stéphane de Sakutin/Agence France-Presse
With the Louvre receiving over eight million visitors last year and other French art collections drawing millions more, further incentives would hardly appear necessary to attract people to this country’s museums.
Indeed, at weekends and during summer vacations, the Louvre, for one, often resembles a crowded railroad station, with Leonardo’s “Mona Lisa” the preferred destination.
Yet there is a problem: in the case of the Louvre, the Musée d’Orsay and other national galleries, where entry tickets cost between €6 and €9, or about $9 and $12, some two-thirds of all visitors are foreign tourists, as are three-quarters of visitors between the ages of 18 and 25.
Now the new government of President Nicolas Sarkozy wants to alter this profile. With a view to persuading more French to enjoy art, it is pondering whether to follow the British and Danish examples of allowing free access to the permanent collections of major museums.
Read full article (International Herald Tribune, July 19, 2007)
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