iMusée Carnavalet – Histoire de ParisLe Marais
Fragments of Paris: Jacques Villeglé and Urban Art
A retrospective marking the centenary of Jacques Villeglé, tracing his practice of collecting torn Parisian street posters and reworking them into art that documents the city's changing urban and cultural landscape.
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In 1949 Jacques Villeglé and his friend Raymond Hains tore their first poster off a hoarding near La Coupole in Montparnasse. He went on to take about 4,500 more from the walls of Paris, each titled with the street and the date he took it.
You start at a panorama of bright posters on a grey wall, the colour of the city's facades before 1959. The route follows him through Montparnasse, Porte Maillot, Saint-Germain-des-Prés and the Marais, onto the Algerian war years and May 68, and out to Miss.Tic's stencils and today's stickers. His best collecting tip, from a 2003 interview: election-results night, when "Paris sleeps" and you can do what you like.
Arts in the City called the route "dense"; the City of Paris, which runs the museum, said it more than loved it. Tickets are €15, €13 reduced and free for under-18s, and the museum advises booking a timed slot. Open Tuesday to Sunday until 17:45 (last entry 16:45). A guided tour runs Saturdays at 10:00.
Look for
42 rue des Francs-Bourgeois, la Chienlit (9 June 1968)
Look for May 68's "La Chienlit, c'est lui" poster, which shrinks de Gaulle to a kepi and a big nose, torn from a wall a few steps from the museum.
Rue de la Fontaine-au-Roi, "1er mai fête du travail" (1972)
Lent by the Mucem, a layered, shredded wall of posters where the slogan "1er mai / fête des travailleurs" survives the tearing and gave the work its title.
Shunk and Kender's photos of Villeglé at work (1961)
Harry Shunk and János Kender followed him around Montparnasse, catching the long walks, the scouting and the quick, discreet cutting and tearing.
Lek & Sowat, Tracés directs (2013)
A video of about twenty artists at the Palais de Tokyo each chalking on a blackboard and wiping it away, until Villeglé adds the final, surviving marks.
Good for
- Nerding Out
- Out-Of-Town Guests
With kids
Free for under-18s. On some Saturdays at 14:30 a one-hour simplified tour, built on easy-to-read texts with object handling and a creative activity, is open to children and families.
Free in the same building
- Gold Stater of the ParisiiA finely struck gold coin of the Parisii, the Gaulish tribe that gave Paris its name, showing a stylised head and a rearing horse in the Celtic style (mid-3rd to 2nd century BC).
- Neolithic Dugout Canoe (Pirogue monoxyle)A dugout canoe carved from a single tree trunk around 4500 BC, unearthed at Bercy beside the Seine, among the oldest evidence of human life on the site of Paris.
- Voltaire's ArmchairA gilded armchair made around 1775 for Voltaire, fitted with a tilting reading stand, a pivoting writing desk and side pouches, a portrait of Enlightenment Paris in furniture.
Also at Musée Carnavalet – Histoire de Paris
On now nearby
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Image credits
9
- Fragments of Paris: Jacques Villeglé and Urban Art© Fonds de dotation Villeglé, Adagp, Paris, 2026. Photo DR
- Parcours : Pablo Picasso au prisme de « Cahiers d'Art »Courtesy of Musée national Picasso-Paris
- Kurt Schwitters. Le chaos-monde, 1918-1948Courtesy of Musée national Picasso-Paris
- Parcours : André Malraux et Pablo Picasso, le musée imaginaireCourtesy of Musée national Picasso-Paris
- Musée Carnavalet – Histoire de ParisMiguel Hermoso Cuesta, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Musée Cognacq-JayCVB / Wikimedia Commons
- Musée national Picasso-ParisFrançois de Dijon, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Maison Européenne de la Photographie (MEP)Mbzt, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0
- Lafayette Anticipations - Fondation Galeries LafayettePhilouSunshine, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0