Seen from behind, a figure without a portrait

Guided tour of the exhibition Vu[e]s de dos, a figure without a portrait.

"To have one's back to the wall", "to turn one's back" or "to make one's back round" are all familiar expressions that convey the symbolic richness of this part of our body. Yet never before has an exhibition chosen it as its central subject.

The fruit of many years of research, this exhibition proposes to understand why the back - when it becomes the main subject of an œback - appears so late in the history of Western art. What social, cultural or artistic upheavals led to its emergence? Why do some periods give it a privileged place, going so far as to confer a precise meaning on it, while others give it less importance?

Conceived as a chronological journey from the Middle Ages to the present day, this exhibition offers thematic interludes, exploring the use of the back in mythological scenes, 19th-century representations of everyday life, and 20th- and 21st-century artists' reinterpretations of the great icons of the past.

Produced with the exceptional support of the Musée d'Orsay, the exhibition brings together prestigious loans from French and foreign collections, including the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Rouen, Bordeaux and Caen, as well as the Louvre, the Musée Ingres-Bourdelle in Montauban, the Musée d'Art et d'Histoire in Geneva and the British Museum.

Some one hundredœworks by such renowned artists as Tiepolo, Watteau, Goya, Toulouse-Lautrec, Rodin and Dufy.