Museum of Orsay

The Musee d'Orsay sits on the southern bank of the Seine opposite the Tuileries and presents French art between 1848 and 1914 at remarkable density. The building was originally Gare d'Orsay, a terminus designed by Victor Laloux for the 1900 World's Fair, whose glazed nave still forms the museum's central axis. After long-distance traffic stopped in 1939 the station risked demolition; only the plan to fill the gap between the Louvre and the Pompidou with the era's art collections saved it, and the museum opened in 1986. Today Manet's Olympia, van Gogh's self-portraits, Degas's dance classes and Monet's late water lilies hang in former waiting rooms. The vast station clock on the fifth floor is one of the most photographed viewpoints in Paris.