Compare and Contract Essay for Palace Museum and Louvre Museum

A museum has many functions including research, acquisition, preservation, interpretation and exhibition. Museums have various communication methods. The artifacts in the museum should first be acquired before preservation, then afterward utilized, and proper research is carried out before any communication about the artifacts. This literature is going to compare Palace Museum (The Forbidden City) in Beijing China, and Louvre Museum in Paris, France. This piece is going to feature on the similarities and differences in the historical backgrounds of the museums, the exhibitions and some of the artworks one may find in the archives.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Order now

The Palace Museum and the Louvre museum have similar historical narratives as they were once palaces used as fortresses by kings and emperors. The name of the Chinese Museum has some history to it, unlike the Louvre. The emperor of the Chinese was supposed to live in the purple Polaris. The purple Polaris was considered to be at the Centre of heaven, and since the emperor was believed to be heavenly, thus his residence was the purple Polaris. People were not allowed to go to the palace without the permission of the emperor, thus the name Forbidden City. Louvre is considered as the worlds largest museum, housing historical collections. Louvre was a Palace for kings and a fortress during the Middle Ages. Before becoming a Museum, Louvre was a palace which had a Baroque- style. The collections in the museum include antiquity from the nineteenth centurys first half (McClellan, pg. 354). The main attractions are Mona Lisa by Leonardo Da Vinci and Venus De Milos Winged Victory of Smooth Race. The Sully Wing is the heart of the Museum, and is the foundation of Augustes old keep. The Palace Museum is in the city of Beijing and was once a Palace for the Mings and Qings dynasty emperors around 1368-1911 (Ho, pg. 13). The Palace Museum, also known as the Forbidden City is similar to Louvre, in that they both were Palaces before they became galleries. They were both used as fortresses by the Kings and royal families of the Middle age. The Palace Museum was built during Chengzus reign between 1368 and 1644. The Palace was built for fourteen years during his reign. The Louvre Palace, on the other hand, was constructed By Phillip Augustus II in the 13th century. The palace museum priceless attractions include; Nai Xiangs Caligraphy Poems and, Zhang Xian Illustrating Ten Songs. They reflected on the Southern city and the song of the dynasty. Further, the name of the Chinese Museum has a historical background to it, unlike the Louvre.

The Scope of both Museums has been able to expand over time. The Museums contained royal collections of sculptures and paintings. The Louvre Museum was then enriched by Napoleonic gifts and purchases, while other artifacts were looted from other places (Evans, pg. 9). The Museum Palace art consists of collections which belonged to the imperial families of the Qing and the Ming dynasties. Additionally, the Palace Museum had artifacts acquired over the years from transfers from other institutions, purchases, and donations. Other similarities are that the Museums have had renovations and improvement to modernize them. The Palace Museum was expanded in the 20th Century with new archeological discoveries, acquisitions and, transfers from other places. The Palace Museum has undergone expansions including modernization, which was part of their five-year plan. The Palace Museum underwent expansion from 2002-2007 thus making it a stunning home for the galleries. While the Palace Museum was developed, the Louvre underwent renovation known as the Grand Louvre. I.M Pei was an architect who was given the project. He designed a glass pyramid, which is more modern as opposed to the baroque facade style of the museum. The glass pyramid has become a celebrated landmark in the design of the museum. The Louvre has also been expanded a number of times, thus losing the characteristics it initially had as a fortress. The pyramids at the entrance connect to the wings of the museum to a central place. The pyramids keep the sides unified in unexpected ways.

The museums have different architectural differences in design and how to access and exit both of them. The Palace Museum has a rectangular shape and sits on an area which covers 76 hectares land. It has more than 8,700 rooms, and a moat surrounds it, approximately 52 meters wide. The Museum Palace also has a wall which is 10 meters wide, and four gates surround it. The Louvre Museum, on the other hand, covers an area of about 650,000 square feet. It has one main entrance. The Palace Museum was constructed along the axis of the North-South. It was built according to the traditional Chinese Confucian culture. The Palace Museum has four entrance gates, and one needs to go through seven gates to reach the living quarters which belonged to the emperor. In the Palace, the divisions are based on grounds, and there is the inner palace to the north and the front palace to the south. The Forbidden City is divided into gardens; mental cultivation hall and the imperial garden. The In Forbidden City, yellow is the color dominating the furnishings since it symbolizes the royal family. The bricks on the ground are yellow in color, the roof and the decorations are also yellow. The structures constructed for specific functions, each representing Chinese hierarchy, power, and imperial authority.

In contrast to the Palace Museum, The Louvre is a U-shaped structure with a pyramid which leads one to the entrance. Pai Louvres architect also featured on underground galleries, laboratories used for preservation and connections between the different wings. These renovations allowed for the Louvre to expand its space utilized in the exhibit. The Louvre has a grand entrance which provides the visitors with a grand lobby and area to view the different galleries. The pyramid juxtaposes the French architectural art with the modern structure, thus bringing a corresponding effect. The Louvre Palace houses ancient Western art and traditional French architecture. Pierre Lecost drew the design of the Museum, and the decorations were made by Jean Goujon, together with the finishing.

The difference of the museums is seen in their unique gallery arrangements, divisions of their galleries and the works of art. Currently, Louvre Museum is divided into different sections according to the art found in the museum. The Louvre has seven galleries. The departments include Islamic art, Egyptian antiquities, Greek and Roman antiquities and ancient antiquities of Mesopotamia. The exhibits also include sculpture, graphic arts and decorative arts. The illustrations found in Palace Museum include court documents, pots, paintings, pottery, clocks and inscribed wares.

While the Treasures of the Palace Museum include embroidery, silver wares, medicines, jewels and other furnishings, the collections of the Louvre Museums paintings are unsurpassed in the world. They are some of the richest collections. The pictures are representative of European arts to 1848. Notably, the museum has paintings from renowned artists. The artworks consist of the Baroque- period art of the Dutch painters and Renaissance artists from Italy. In the decorative section of the Louvre, there is a display of the French treasure including pottery, jewelry, the Bronzes of French Kings, Egyptian and Roman antiques. The most celebrated pieces in The Forbidden City are Cabbage carved from Jadeite, which is a carved stone and natural colors are used to curve a vegetable with a camouflaged grasshopper. There is also an Olive Stone Art Used to Carve a Boat, which is viewed from the magnifying glass. The Palace Museum boast of some of the oldest pieces like Loop Earrings and a Chunky Necklace dating back to 8,000 years back. The other pieces is a Jade Cup which was believed to secure immortality if dew is collected and sipped from the cup.

In the Forbidden City, some of the most expensive artworks are made of porcelain material; they are Ju Ware ceramics made in the 11th century. Examples of such pieces include classic blue and white Ming and Qing vases. The Ju Ware found in the Palace Museum are 70, and this is a third of the Ju Ware known to exist. At any given time, one can view 3,000 pieces in the Palace Museum (Hall, pg. 98). The Museum has a rotation for the permanent collection after every three months. The Palace Museum has had a digitization program since 1988. The digital program serves to manage artifacts, preserve and archive them. This has given opportunities to various artists who have use the digitized artworks to create animations, and other institutions have been able to exhibit the work. In the Louvre the Sully Wing has a seated scribe on the ground floor. In room 3 it has the Code of Hammurabi and the famous Winged Samothrace, at the Denon wing. Many great arts can be found in the Denon wing including; Raphaels work such as Titan and Botticelli and Michelangelos Dying Slave in the ground floor. Other famous French pieces include The Raft by Medusa.

Conclusion

Museums are interesting places to visit as they engage history from many centuries ago like the Louvre and The Palace Augustus and Ming/Qing dynasties. Museums also help the visitors to interact one one with the artifacts found in them. Surprisingly, Museums can tell about how people socialized and how they used certain artifacts, like the Buddha in Louvre for Indians. We see socializations artifacts like the Jade Cup, which was used to perform the drinking dew ritual by the Chinese. The Louvre is not only famous for the priceless arts found there, but also for the long queues one makes before they get to see the arts in the gallery. However, such lines can be skipped by buying tickets and making the necessary arrangements. The palace Museum on the other hand is rich with Chinese culture which shows identities of nine rulers.

Works cited

Evans, Jessica, and David Boswell. Representing the nation: a reader: histories, heritage and

museums. Psychology Press, 1999.

McClellan, Andrew. Inventing the Louvre: Art, politics, and the origins of the modern museum in

eighteenth-century Paris. Univ of California Press, 1994.

Ho, Chuimei, Bennet Bronson, and Field Museum of Natural History. Splendors of China's

Forbidden City: the glorious reign of Emperor Qianlong;[The Field Museum, Chicago, March 12-September 12, 2004]. Merrell, 2004.

Hall, Dickson. Chinese paintings in the Palace Museum, Beijing, 4th-14th century. Joint

Pub.(HK) Co., 1989.

Top of Form

The Louvre. Mosman: iMinds, 2009. Internet resource.

Bottom of Form