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the museum), locals and visitors alike often find the prospect of an afternoon at a smaller museum far more inviting, meaning the Louvre may be the most actively avoided museum in the world. Eventually, most people do their duty and visit, but many leave overwhelmed, unfulfilled, exhausted and frustrated at having got lost on their way to da Vinci’s La Joconde, better known as Mona Lisa (Room 6, 1st floor, Salle de la Joconde, Denon Wing; boxed text). Since it takes several serious visits to get anything more than a brief glimpse of the works on offer, your best bet – after checking out a few that you really want to see – is to choose a particular period or section of the Louvre and pretend that the rest is in another museum somewhere across town.

The most famous works from antiquity include the Seated Scribe (Room 22, 1st floor, Sully Wing), the Code of Hammurabi (Room 3, ground floor, Richelieu Wing) and that armless duo, the Venus de Milo (Room 7, ground floor, Denon Wing) and the Winged Victory of Samothrace (opposite Room 1, 1st floor, Denon Wing). From the Renaissance, don’t miss Michelangelo’s The Dying Slave (ground floor, Michelangelo Gallery, Denon Wing) and works by Raphael, Botticelli and Titian (1st floor, Denon Wing). French masterpieces of the 19th century include Ingres’ The Turkish Bath (Room 60, 2nd floor, Sully Wing), Géricault’s The Raft of the Medusa (Room 77, 1st floor, Denon Wing) and works by Corot, Delacroix and Fragonard (2nd floor, Denon Wing).

The main entrance and ticket windows in the Cour Napoléon are covered by the 21m-high Grande Pyramide, a glass pyramid designed by the Chinese-born American architect IM Pei. You can avoid the queues outside the pyramid or at the Porte des Lions entrance by entering the Louvre complex via the Carrousel du Louvre entrance (Map), at 99 rue de Rivoli, or by following the ‘Musée du Louvre’ exit from the Palais Royal-Musée du Louvre metro station. Buy your tickets in advance from the ticket machines in the Carrousel du Louvre, online or by ringing 08 92 68 36 22 or 08 25 34 63 46, or from the billeteries (ticket offices) of Fnac for an extra €1.10, and walk straight in without queuing. Tickets are valid for the whole day, so you can come and go as you please. They are also valid for the Musée National Eugène Delacroix on the same day.

The Louvre is divided into four sections: the Sully, Denon and Richelieu Wings and Hall Napoléon. Sully creates the four sides of the Cour Carrée (literally ‘square courtyard’) at the eastern end of the complex. Denon stretches along the Seine to the south; Richelieu is the northern wing runing along rue de Rivoli.

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TRANSPORT: LOUVRE & LES HALLES

Bus Louvre (rue de Rivoli) for 27 over Pont St-Michel, up blvd St-Michel to Jardin du Luxembourg, rue Claude Bernard (for rue Mouffetard) & Place d’Italie; rue de Rivoli (near Louvre Rivoli metro) for 69 to Invalides, Champ de Mars (Eiffel Tower) and for 72 for place de la Concorde, Grand Palais, Alma Marceau, Bois de Boulogne & Porte de St-Cloud; Châtelet for 38 to blvd St-Michel & Jardin du Luxembourg, for 47 to Place Monge (rue Mouffetard), Place d’Italie and 13e (Chinatown), for 67 to Pigalle & for 85 to Barbès & Porte de Clignancourt & Porte de St-Ouen flea markets

Metro & RER Bourse, Châtelet, Châtelet-Les Halles, Concorde, Étienne Marcel, Les Halles, Louvre-Rivoli, Palais Royal-Musée du Louvre, Pont Neuf, Rambuteau, Tuileries

Boat Musée du Louvre Batobus stop (quai du Louvre)

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The split-level public area under the Grande Pyramide is known as the Hall Napoléon ( 9am-10pm Wed-Mon). The hall has an exhibit on the history of the Louvre, a bookshop, restaurant, café, auditoriums for concerts, lectures and films, and CyberLouvre ( 10am-5.45pm Wed-Mon), an internet research centre with online access to some 35,000 works of art. The centrepiece of the Carrousel du Louvre, the shopping centre that runs underground from the pyramid to the Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel, is the pyramide inversée (inverted glass pyramid), also the work of Pei.

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