French President Emmanuel Macron has announced that the Mona Lisa will get its own dedicated room inside the Louvre museum in Paris, which he said will be renovated and expanded in a major overhaul that will take years to complete.
The renovation will include a new entrance near the river Seine, to be opened by 2031, and the creation of underground rooms, Mr Macron said in a speech from the Louvre room where the Mona Lisa is displayed.
Mr Macron did not disclose the cost, estimated to run into hundreds of millions of euros, to modernise the most visited museum in the world, which is plagued with overcrowding and outdated facilities.
He also said on Tuesday that non-EU visitors will pay a higher entrance fee than EU visitors.
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The Louvre’s last overhaul dates back to the 1980s, when its famous glass pyramid was unveiled. However, the museum is no longer up to international standards.
Louvre director Laurence des Cars had expressed a series of concerns to culture minister Rachida Dati earlier this month saying the museum is threatened by “obsolescence”.
According to the document first released by French newspaper Le Parisien, Ms des Cars warned about the gradual degradation of the building due to water leaks, temperature variations and other issues “endangering the preservation of artworks”.
The pyramid that serves at the museum’s entrance, unveiled in 1989 as part of late president Francois Mitterand’s project, now appears outdated.
The place is not properly insulated from the cold and the heat tends to amplify noise, making the space uncomfortable for both the public and the staff, Ms des Cars stressed.
In addition, the museum suffers from a lack of food offerings and restroom facilities, she said.
“We’re faced with a collective challenge,” an official at the French presidency said. “That is, how can we adapt the Louvre to expectations, welcome visitors from across the world in comfortable conditions and also be leading a commitment for artistic and cultural education?”
Half of the Louvre’s budget is financed by the French state, including the wages of the 2,200 employees.
The other half is provided by private funds including ticket sales, earnings from restaurants, shops and bookings for special events, as well as patrons and other partners. That includes the United Arab Emirates’ financing for the right to use the brand for the Louvre Abu Dhabi museum.
Questions have also arisen about how the Mona Lisa should be displayed.
Ms des Cars asked for the issue to be “reassessed”, suggesting a possible transfer of the museum’s most popular attraction to another room that would be specifically dedicated to it, which is what Mr Macron has said will happen.
The Mona Lisa is now being shown in the museum’s largest room, overcrowded with long, noisy queues of visitors eager to take a selfie with Leonardo da Vinci’s masterpiece.
Other paintings in the room by the greatest Venetian painters such as Titian and Veronese go unnoticed by many.
Last year, the Louvre received 8.7 million visitors, more than three-quarters being foreigners mostly from the United States, China and neighbouring countries Italy, the UK, Germany and Spain. – AP
