More about Ceiling of the Paris Opera

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Sr. Editor

You will need a cheap ticket to the ballet to see Chagall's masterpiece of a ceiling up close. 


Chagall's piece covers the original ceiling done by Jules-Eugène Lenepveu titled The Muses and the Hours of the Day and Night. To be fair, the original  does seem to blend better with the rest of the architecture. But what kind of artist wants their work to blend in?


Depicts scenes from various operas by composers such as Mozart, Wagner, Debussy, Tchaikovsky, and Beethoven.


The French did not like the idea of a Russian Jew in their opera house or of a modern painter in such a nationally historic building.


At 77-years-old it only took him a year to complete the commission. The canvas, separated into five pieces, is 2,400 square feet and used 440 pounds of paint!