Maison européenne de la photographie, Art museum in Le Marais, Paris, France.
The Maison Européenne de la Photographie occupies the Hôtel Hénault de Cantobre, a mansion built in 1706 at 5/7 rue de Fourcy and owned by the City of Paris since 1914. Architect Yves Lion restored and extended it, adding a wing on the street; the pale stone facade carries a red banner and the incised word "LA PHOTOGRAPHIE" above the entrance passage. Inside are exhibition rooms, a library, an auditorium and a bookstore under 18th-century vaults.
The museum opened in 1996 within the Hôtel du Président Hénault, a historic mansion that had been repurposed for this new cultural use. Its founding came at a moment when photography was gaining recognition as a serious artistic medium.
The MEP takes its name from its mission to show photography from across Europe and beyond, with three exhibition cycles a year devoted mainly to artists, themes and movements of the second half of the 20th century and the 21st. Its library, named after photography historian Roméo Martinez, holds 36,000 volumes consulted on site, and the auditorium honours photographer Bernard Pierre Wolff.
The museum is near Saint-Paul metro station and easily accessible by public transportation. Visitors should check opening days in advance to plan their visit effectively.
The building's central staircase lost its period ironwork during Yves Lion's renovation, and the old carriage houses along rue de Fourcy were demolished to add a new wing. The library is named after Roméo Martinez, a photography historian who died in 1990, and the 100-seat auditorium honours photographer Bernard Pierre Wolff, who died in 1985.
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