Whether you’re traveling with family or friends, a private tour provides a highly-personalized experience. Ask your professional guide as many questions as you want - a private tour moves at your pace! A private Musée d'Orsay tour is also an excellent option if you have limited mobility. Your vacation in Paris is tailored to you, and a private tour is a more intimate experience for you and your loved ones. This private 3-hour tour includes:

• Skip the line tickets

• An expert English-speaking guide

• A private tour of the Musée d'Orsay

• Customizable group size

Skip the Line Musée d'Orsay Tour

This private tour includes skip the line Musée d'Orsay tickets, so you don’t need to wait in line with thousands of people. Once inside, your private tour of the Louvre begins. All our Musée d'Orsay guides are passionate experts in art history. As you stop by all the best masterpieces, learn the stories behind them and the artists who created them. Besides the highlights of the Musée d'Orsay, visit artwork that is mostly unknown. And remember, there is no need to consult your guidebook or map, our guides know the Musée d'Orsay as well as their own living rooms. 

The Train Station (Gare)

The current Musée d’Orsay was previously a train station (Called Gare in French) and hotel which was built in time in only 2 years and inaugurated in time for the World's Fair on July 14th, 1900. In order to ensure that such a massive structure didn’t look out of place, the particular stone chosen from the Charente and Poitou regions.

The amenities were extremely modern for their time with ramps and lifts for luggage, elevators for the passengers, a reception area on the ground floor, electric traction, and 16 underground rail tracks.

It immediately became the head of the Southwestern French railroad network. The hotel became a popular venue for various gatherings of associations and political parties.

Impressionism

The Musée d'Orsay is all about Impressionism. While it is not the only art style in the Museum, it is the primary reason most people come to visit. The biggest artists living in Paris in the late 19th century are all represented here- You will see not only Manet, Monet and Van Gogh, but also Gauguin, Renoir and Caillebotte. Your expert tour guide will make the experience come alive by explaining not only the paintings themselves, but also the stories behind the paintings and the artists.

Impressionism started out as a kind of rebellion movement against the standard painting style of the time, which was a more classicist approach. The Academy of Fine Arts in Paris ruled the art world at the time and also organized the famous Salons where an artist could submit his work and therefore become well known. If you didn't stick to Academy's rules and way of thinking, it was almost impossible to make it in the art world.

The Impressionists as they became known, were more interested in natural light and the first "impression" that one feels when they see the artwork, rather than the subject itself. This is why you will notice very often, the impressionist painters use of light is extremely important and the picture could be be "fuzzy" looking with unusual brushstrokes. The idea was the impression you felt when you first looked at it.