Social Events

Welcome reception

All WIA2MIS attendees are invited to the welcome reception at Telecom ParisTech under the theme of Jazz, Wine & Cheese.

Banquet

The main social event of WIA2MIS 2013 will take place July 4th 2013 in the Musée d’Orsay on the left bank of the Seine. It will begin by a visit of the museum and will continue with a dinner in the restaurant of the museum.

The museum building was originally a railway station, Gare d’Orsay, constructed for the Chemin de Fer de Paris à Orléans and finished in time for the 1900 Exposition Universelle to the design of three architects: Lucien Magne, Émile Bénard and Victor Laloux. It was the terminus for the railways of southwestern France until 1939.

By 1939 the station’s short platforms had become unsuitable for the longer trains that had come to be used for mainline services. After 1939 it was used for suburban services and part of it became a mailing centre during World War II. It was then used as a set for several films, such as Kafka’s The Trial adapted by Orson Welles, and as a haven for the Renaud–Barrault Theatre Company and for auctioneers, while the Hôtel Drouot was being rebuilt.

In 1970, permission was granted to demolish the station but Jacques Duhamel, Minister for Cultural Affairs, ruled against plans to build a new hotel in its stead. The station was put on the supplementary list of Historic Monuments and finally listed in 1978. The suggestion to turn the station into a museum came from the Directorate of the Museums of France. The idea was to build a museum that would bridge the gap between the Louvre and the National Museum of Modern Art at the Georges Pompidou Centre. The plan was accepted by Georges Pompidou and a study was commissioned in 1974. In 1978, a competition was organized to design the new museum. ACT Architecture, a team of three young architects (Pierre Colboc, Renaud Bardon and Jean-Paul Philippon), were awarded the contract which involved creating 20,000 sq. m. of new floorspace on four floors. The construction work was carried out by Bouygues. In 1981, the Italian architect, Gae Aulenti was chosen to design the interior including the internal arrangement, decoration, furniture and fittings of the museum. Finally in July 1986, the museum was ready to receive its exhibits. It took 6 months to install the 2000 or so paintings, 600 sculptures and other works. The museum officially opened in December 1986 by then-president, François Mitterrand.

Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License: Source : Article Musée d’Orsay of Wikipédia English

 

Visit Of the Musée d’Orsay

The Musée d’Orsay is home to the biggest collection of impressionist and post-impressionist art in the world. It also features a remarkable collection of symbolist, realistic and academic paintings including foreign schools. More than 5000 paintings composing the Musée d’Orsay collection are waiting for you.

(1) Vincent van Gogh: Starry Night Over the Rhone, 1888 (2) Édouard Manet: The Luncheon on the Grass, 1862 (3) Van Gogh, Autoportrait, 1889 (4) Gustave Courbet: The Artist Studio, 1855 (Those files are from the Wikimedia Commons)

 

Dinner in the restaurant of the Musée d’Orsay

After the visit the social event will continue with a dinner at the restaurant of the museum.

The old restaurant, located on the first floor of the museum, kept all its magnificence since its opening in 1900. You could admire the sparkling chandeliers, the painted ceilings and the gilding decoration of the room, classed as a historical monument.