While Chagall’s painting style was (and still remains) so astonishingly distinctive and instantly recognizable, in this massive creation he nevertheless paid homage to the giants of the operatic arts. “Out with the old, bring on the modern magic!” insisted some. This was in the early 1960s, when writhing scenes of contorted humanity and assorted chubby chaps were considered – at least by some people – to be so tediously tired and academic. In a feat of cultural controversy and daring, the incomparable and brilliantly original “magical surrealist” artist, Marc Chagall, was commissioned by the French government to create a vast painting of 240 square metres (2,400 square feet) to replace the original Baroque-style circular panels. A radically different artwork on the ceiling It can be seen directly above the seven-tonne bronze chandelier in the vast theatre auditorium. The whole interior from the 1860s and ‘70s appears to be unified by those outrageously over-the-top elements.īut not quite! There is one major element of the interior decoration that is utterly different. It seems that every conceivable space is occupied by lavishly-detailed and gilded decorative accents, grand sweeps of marble or by seething masses of fleshy cherubs flying around in painted skies above.

The Palais Garnier opera house in Paris has an interior that is a golden riot of overwhelming Baroque and Neo-classical opulence.

Paris opera house ceiling painting