Galerie David d'Angers

Introduction

The Galerie David d'Angers stands in central Angers, in France's Pays de la Loire region, and has occupied the restored church of the Abbaye Toussaint, the abbey of All Saints, since 1984. This thirteenth-century Gothic hall was converted to give sculpture a bright setting, and a glass roof covers the gallery, with daylight diffusing over pale plaster and marble, which is the most moving thing about the place. The gallery is devoted to the Angers-born sculptor Pierre-Jean David d'Angers (1788-1856), a pivotal figure between French neoclassicism and romanticism, both an author of large public monuments and one of the busiest bust sculptors of his day. Three strands in the collection: First, the full-scale plaster models for his facade commission at the Pantheon in Paris, the largest single object in the gallery. One common error worth correcting: the Pantheon's dome is not David d'Angers' work and was not designed by him; what he did there was the facade commission, and what is displayed here is that facade in full-scale plaster. Second, a group of busts and medallions of contemporaries including Victor Hugo, Balzac, Goethe and Lafayette. Taken together the busts read like an album of early nineteenth-century European notables. Third, models and maquettes for large monuments, sketches and working manuscripts. The models show how he handled scale and composition in public commemorative sculpture, while the sketches and manuscripts lay out the whole working path from concept through clay to finished work. Admission and hours: 4 euros for adults, free for under-26s, group rates for ten or more; closed Mondays, Tuesday to Sunday 10:00-18:00 and extended to 20:00 on Fridays, with 1 May and 1 November among the holiday closures. The claim of a free first Sunday of the month appears only on third-party travel sites and is not confirmed officially, so do not plan around it; for a saving, look at the Angers City Pass. There is also no special summer extension to 19:00, an error in older guides. Best time: Friday evenings are quietest, and a sunny afternoon gives the best light through the glass roof for looking at plaster and marble detail. Sequencing: two more must-sees within walking distance of the old town, the Musee des Beaux-Arts with its fourteenth to eighteenth century paintings, and the Chateau d'Angers with the Apocalypse tapestry. All three plus a walk through the old town makes a full day.

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