Laïcité et Art français: lumières de la foi et de la raison

About

Date

January 17 - March 22, 2026

Location

Temporary Exhibition Galleries 1-4

Hours

9:30 a.m. -5:00 p.m.

Closed

Mondays (except February 23), February 24 (Tuesday)

Admission fee

Adults: 1000 (800) yen
Students: 800 (600) yen
High school students and younger: Free
Prices in parentheses are for groups of more than 20 persons.
Persons with disability, one person accompanying them are admitted free of charge.

Organization

■Organized by
Mie Prefectural Art Museum
The Chunichi Shimbun

■Special Cooperation
Machida City Museum of Graphic Arts

■Planning Cooperation
The Shimotsuke Shimbun

■Academic Cooperation
Date Kiyonobu (Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, The University of Tokyo, Komaba)

■With the support of
Ise City
Ise city School Board

■With the grant of
The Kao Foundation for Arts and Sciences
The Cultural Foundation of Okada
Mie Prefectural Art Museum Assistance Foundation
POLA ART FOUNDATION (For Research)
 

Exhibition Overview

‘Laïcité’ refers to the system whereby the state is independent of religion and guarantees people freedom of belief and spiritual equality, as well as the ideology underpinning it. Whilst it is a concept that forms the very foundation of the French Republic, laïcité has many facets, ranging from the ideal of coexistence between people of different faiths—or those with no faith at all—to the strict separation of political power and religion.
This exhibition draws a line of laïcité through modern French art, proposing a new way of appreciating it. The French Revolution, which erupted at the end of the 18th century, sought to find light in human reason, rejecting the rule of the monarchy and the Catholic Church in an attempt to establish a new order. Subsequently, a conflict arose between those seeking to restore the country’s Catholic traditions and those who, inheriting the ideals of the Revolution, sought to promote laïcité. Art, too, was influenced by this conflict; it broke away from the power of the nobility and the Church, and came to acquire a ‘sacredness’ of its own. This exhibition presents approximately 200 works, including French oil paintings, prints and sculptures from the period of the French Revolution to the mid-20th century, shedding new light on a collection of masterpieces from domestic collections.

*This exhibition is a touring exhibition held at two venues: the Utsunomiya Museum of Art (12 October [Sun] – 21 December [Sun] 2025) and the Mie Prefectural Art Museum.