Louvre's Galerie d'Apollon reopens

PARIS.— Closed since it was robbed on 19 October 2025, the Galerie d'Apollon has reopened its doors to the public on 22 July 2026.

The collection of precious objects it held was removed, letting visitors lend their full attention to the painted and sculpted décor. The gallery, itself designed as an artwork in the 17th century, thus returns to its ceremonial function. It also becomes a place to wander and contemplate freely at the heart of the museum, linking the Rotonde d'Apollon to the Salon Carré, opening onto the Grande Galerie.

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A royal gallery decorated by the greatest French artists (Charles Le Brun, François Girardon, Jean-Jacques Lagrenée, Eugène Delacroix…), the Galerie d'Apollon was a model for the Château de Versailles's Hall of Mirrors.

Designed as a reception gallery for Louis XIV, it features exceptional decoration. Some 61.34 metres long, with a ceiling 15 metres high, for a total surface of 600 square metres, it was built over 350 years ago and decorated over a span of two centuries. Its rich decoration blending stucco, paintings and tapestries – masterpieces from the Gobelins manufactory commissioned by architect Félix Duban for the gallery and installed there in 1852 – makes the Galerie d'Apollon one of the most iconic spaces at the Louvre.

The Galerie d'Apollon through the ages

The Petite Galerie or Gallery of Kings

Here, in the reign of Charles IX (1560–1574), there was a portico surmounted by a terrace. This served as a promenade, linking the Cour Carrée and the Louvre's perimeter wall which ran along the river Seine. Under Henri IV (1589–1610), this exposed structure gave way to a building enclosed by walls and leading to the Grande Galerie. The Petite Galerie, on the first floor of this new building, near the king's apartments, became a symbol of his power.

The Petite Galerie was built between 1594 and 1596. It featured a painted and sculpted décor glorifying the kings and queens of France, as well as other famous men and women. This work, long since gone, was created by painters Toussaint Dubreuil (1561–1602) and (later) Jacob Bunel (1558–1614), alongside sculptor Pierre Biard (1559–1609). The gallery was first a passageway, then a place of representation for the court, with decoration extolling the king's dynastic and political legitimacy.

From the Petite Galerie to the Galerie d'Apollon

The Galerie d'Apollon was the work of architect Louis Le Vau (1661–1670) and a painting and decorating team led by Charles Le Brun (1619–1690). Work on the gallery began in 1662, but it was interrupted in 1671 when Louis XIV chose the Château de Versailles as his preferred residence, abandoning the Louvre.

On 6 February 1661, a fire destroyed the decoration of the Petite Galerie. Le Vau rebuilt the structure, adding in new buildings.

Work on the new décor was entrusted to Le Brun in 1663. He used the figure of Apollo as a decorating scheme, as Louis XIV had just chosen it for a symbol.

As the sun god, Apollo ruled over the distribution of the four elements, the parts of the day, the planets' course in the sky and the cycle of months and seasons. The sun's auspicious influence symbolised the king's good government, which allowed the kingdom to prosper.

The majestic décor alternated between large painted compartments, medallions and stucco figures, heralding the vaulted ceiling of the Château de Versailles' Hall of Mirrors (1678–1684). François Girardon, Thomas Regnaudin and the Marsy brothers created the sculptures. For each of them, this marked the beginning of a brilliant career which would take them to the Versailles worksite.

Enhancing the décor in the 18th century: The role of the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture

In the 18th century, the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture, headquartered in the Louvre since 1692, directed the further development of the decoration of the Galerie d'Apollon. The Academy thus made an attempt to complete the unfinished painted decoration of the ceiling.

From 1763, they were granted control of the Galerie. Until 1775, their workshop, the École Royale des Élèves Protégés, was set up there. Paintings from the Academy's own collection were put on display, as well as the four paintings from Charles Le Brun's (1619–1690) immense History of Alexander.

As artists wishing to join the Academy were required to submit an artwork for consideration by the institute, some were asked to paint mythological compositions as reception pieces, to complete the ceiling décor. A number of paintings were made to that purpose between 1769 and 1781: Spring, by Antoine François Callet (1741–1823), Autumn, by Jean Hugues Taraval (1729–1785), Summer, by Louis Jacques Durameau (1733–1796), and Winter, by Jean-Jacques Lagrenée (1739–1821), as well as Castor or the Morning Star by Antoine Renou (1731–1806).

The Galerie d'Apollon in the 19th century: Restoring and completing the décor

Mindful of the Musée du Louvre's prestige, the government of the Second French Republic (1848–1851) ordered the restoration of the Galerie d'Apollon and the completion of its decoration.

The architect Félix Duban (1798–1870) oversaw the project that would give the gallery its final aspect. To preserve the stylistic unity of the design created under Louis XIV, Duban asked contemporary painters to complete the vault's missing decorative elements by drawing from the subjects and compositions imagined in 1663 by Charles Le Brun. Eugène Delacroix (1798–1863) was put in charge of the central compartment, representing Apollo Slaying the Serpent Python. He took up the challenge with a spiralling composition, designed to be viewed from below: a perfect match for the surrounding decorations, though they predated Delacroix's work by two centuries.

For the walls, Duban reconstructed Louis XIV-style wood panelling, into which he integrated a series of 28 tapestry portraits woven at the Gobelins manufactory between 1854 and 1863. These represented famous men whose work had contributed to the construction and beautification of the Louvre and the Tuileries from the very beginning.

The Galerie d'Apollon from the Second Empire to today

Within the recently created museum, works were displayed in the Galerie d'Apollon as early as 1797. Precious objects from the royal collections were exhibited there from 1861 on, in custom-made display cases.

The Galerie d'Apollon thus became a presentation space for jewels from the collection of Louis XIV and for Marie Antoinette's lacquerware. Display cases in sculpted and gilt wood were made to match the gallery's décor. Among the works they presented were the masterpieces from the treasuries of the abbey of Saint-Denis and of the Order of the Holy Spirit.

Under the Third French Republic, in 1887, a law mandated that the French Crown Jewels should be sold, even though this collection of diamonds and jewels that had belonged to the sovereigns of France had acquired inalienable status in 1530, during the reign of François I. Eight of these jewels were, however, preserved for the Musée du Louvre, to be displayed in the Galerie d'Apollon in newly made cases. This collection was supplemented with new pieces over time.

On 19 October 2025, two burglars broke into the gallery and stole eight 19th-century jewels. The gallery remained closed for several months. In the summer of 2026, it was restored to its function as a ceremonial gallery, itself designed as an artwork in the 17th century.