Regards sur la vie quotidienne, the exhibition at the Musée de Cluny: our pictures

How did women and men live in the Middle-Age? This is the question the Musée de Cluny - musée national du Moyen-Âge asks visitors and other curious with the latest exhibition running from July 1 to September 27, 2020 and called “Regards sur la vie quotidienne”. An exhibition taking place just before the total closing of the museum for renovations in May 2021.

Through a selection of works of art coming from the museum’s collection, history enthusiasts are invited to discover these “looks on the daily life” that the museum’s curators have on these historic moments of everyday life. Items displayed as an echo to the "Trésors" exhibition highlighting works of grand prestige and subtle sophistication.

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But what do these exhibited items teach us? That “everyday needs” are the same from the Middle-Age to nowadays. Accommodating, sleeping, taking care of ourselves, eating, “feeding one’s mind and spirituality, measuring time, distances or quantities”… Needs and other human conceptualizations have had or still have, no matter when. And an exhibition that aims at breaking the preconceived ideas on different topics such as cleanliness showing “all the care taken for washing and dressing” or learning “as games of imitation or scholar works”.

All in all, some 200 daily items are displayed, some are exceptionally taken out of the stock, showing a “new light” on the museum’s collections. Tin spoon, cups passed from person to person, Hispanic-Moorish cutlery… As many stories told about the daily life “which preciosity changes with the social category to which they were destined”. How about discovering our ancestors’ life, friends, shall we?