For Nuit des Musées, the Monnaie de Paris is opening its doors to us free of charge on Saturday, May 18, 2024 . As always, the museum is pulling out all the stops, with a host of activities including guided and unguided tours, and a host of other facilities.
A museum housed in France's oldest institution, one of the world's oldest companies. It was created in 864, with the promulgation of the Edict of Pîtres, by Charles II. At the time, it was a Parisian monetary workshop attached to the Crown, complementing the eight other workshops located in the provinces. It was the only workshop in France to produce coinage without interruption since its creation, and it went on to become the leading workshop in the kingdom during theAncien Régime.
The museum is dedicated to the arts of metal, and takes you to the heart of the history of the creation of coins around the world, through its permanent collections and temporary exhibitions. The tour also touches on various disciplines, such as art, science, history, sociology and economics, with the aim of expressing the richness and diversity of the institution's collections.
Curious visitors to the museum can discover the secrets of transformed materials, know-how and craftsmanship handed down over 1150 years, in dialogue with exceptional heritage collections. Paced by views of the workshops, demonstrations, educational videos, playful devices and olfactory atmospheres, discover the history of coinage, the history of France, techniques and sciences...
The European Night of Museums, a golden opportunity to discover the temple of know-how dedicated to metal and for 2024 strikes the athletes' medals...
Who has ever seen an Olympic medal? Who knows what meaning it holds for the winner, and what symbols it represents for society?
Follow in the footsteps of a mediator and discover the history and manufacturing processes of the Olympic medal, as well as what it represents and symbolizes over the course of time.
Since 1896, when the first Olympic medal was produced by La Monnaie de Paris, these distinctions have been awarded to the world's elite athletes for over a century. Sport, however, is conspicuously absent from Olympic medal designs... The exhibition is complemented by a selection of sports medal tools (other than Olympic ones), created by Béatrice Coullaré, where artists have been free to express their vision of gesture and effort.
The myths and legends of coinage are told to you by mediators stationed in the halls, who reveal the secrets behind the manufacture of medals and trophies at La Monnaie de Paris.
The processes involved in the manufacture of coins and medals, from metal extraction to minting, interact with the museum's rich heritage collections.
To mark the Games of the XXXIII Olympiad of the Modern Era in Paris, the Musée de la Monnaie de Paris wanted to highlight the art and history of the Olympic medal. An object that the Monnaie de Paris knows well as a historic medal manufacturer.
In 1896, on the occasion of the first Olympic Games of the modern era in Athens, Monnaie de Paris struck the very first Olympic medal. This was again the case for the Games of 1900, 1924 and 1968.
From Antiquity to the present day, this is the moment of Victory and Reward that the exhibition aims to recount, through the medal itself, but also through the objects, images and archives that contextualize it. The supreme moment that the medal represents has evolved over the years, reflecting the evolution of the Games themselves, and hence that of the world.
Surprisingly, however, sport seems to be the big absentee from the Olympic medal, in favor of the timeless allegory and consensual symbol! The exhibition is complemented by a selection of sports medals (other than Olympic ones), created by Béatrice Coullaré, where artists have been able to express their vision of gesture and effort much more freely. A counterpoint that presents a little-known part of the Monnaie de Paris collection of medals and medallic tools.
At the heart of the Musée de la Monnaie de Paris, in the factory's main hall, watch demonstrations of continuous direct-cut engraving carried out by a skilled craftsman, perpetuating age-old traditional gestures that allow you to discover the different stages in the manufacture of coins, as well as sports medals.
The Cma6 piano department, with the help of students from the dance, theater and chamber music classes, invites you to immerse yourself in the poetic universe of composer Erik Satie, in the heart of the prestigious Salon Dupré at La Monnaie de Paris.
A plunge into the whimsical and sur-realistic universe, as Apollinaire described it, of this composer fond of irony, in connection with sporting values.
His work "Sports et Divertissements" was conceived in this spirit. Swimmers, tennis players and acrobats will also be featured in the other excerpts offered during this Olympiad.
Ready to go? Insert Coin* and... you're ready to play!
The exhibition evokes the history of coin-operated gaming machines, whose golden age in France stretched from the late 1960s to the late 1990s.
This period saw the rise of table soccer, pinball machines, jukeboxes, video game terminals and other electromechanical games that fostered a café and arcade culture. The contextual, interactive visitor experience is structured by a chronological tour featuring the must-have machines of these periods in settings evocative of the cafés and arcades of the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s and 1990s. The exhibition also examines the value and use of money, with a particular focus on pocket money as seen through the eyes of the machines' users, mainly teenagers.
Beyond the stories it tells, the exhibition puts visitors in the position of physically rediscovering the experience of using a coin to operate a game. To this end, La Monnaie de Paris has produced a series of specific, non-monetary game coins or tokens at its Pessac factory, which visitors will receive at the start of the tour, enabling them to activate authentic, playable period machines in their original material conditions.
Hotel? A palace? A factory or museum? Don't panic! Follow the guide, who will reveal the thousand and one architectural facets of this enigmatic building by the light of a torch.
By the light of a torch, discover the Monnaie de Paris, the last active factory in the heart of Paris.
A visit in the half-light, allowing you to discover the architectural lines, style, décor and surprising and... telling details of the Hôtel de la Monnaie!
Great activities to see the museum differently and discover all the secrets of these unique collections. Shall we go?
Dates and Opening Time
On May 18th, 2024
From 07:00 p.m. to 12:00 a.m.
Location
Paris Mint
11, quai Conti
75006 Paris 6
Prices
Free
Official website
www.monnaiedeparis.fr
