Opening of the New Louvre Annex in Lens

The long-awaited annex of the Louvre opens December 12 in Lens, in the Nord-Pas de Calais region, a little over an hour from Paris on the high-speed TGV.

The new museum, in a low-rise, steel-and-glass building designed by Japanese architects Ryue Nishizawa and Kazuyo Sejima, will debut with a semipermanent selection of 205 works from the Louvre’s vast holdings, comprising a succinct history of art from the 4th millenium BC to the mid-19th century—Egyptian, Greek and Roman statuary, Byzantine mosaics, medieval and Renaissance European paintings and sculpture, and classic 18th- and 19th-century French works including Eugène Delacroix’s iconic July 28, Liberty Guiding the People (1830). The inaugural temporary exhibit, Renaissance, will offer works by Old Masters including Mantegna, Dürer, Van Eyck, Cranach and Raphael.