In 1962, Marc Chagall embarked on a secret commission from the French culture minister, André Malraux: 24 wedge-shaped canvases to be installed on the ceiling of Paris’s Palais Garnier opera house. His canvases covered a fresco painted by the mostly-forgotten 19th century painter, Jules-Eugène Lenepveu. His family is now planning legal action to uncover the original ceiling.
Arnaud Carayon, president of the Friends of Lenepveu Society (and the artist’s great-great-great-great-grandnephew) is leading the charge. Carayon previously renovated Lenepveu’s Angers tomb in 2022. Lenepveu is best known for his Joan of Arc frescoes in the Paris Pantheon, and was the recent subject of a 260-work retrospective at the city’s Musée des Beaux Arts.
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Carayon has spent the last three years trying to get the opera to uncover the original frescoes, including writing an appeal to France’s president, Emmanuel Macron. He now plans to take his fight to court. “Today, everyone has forgotten Lenepveu. Unfortunately, he was swept away by the wave of impressionism, but in his time he was really a star,” said Carayon, “More importantly, he was specifically chosen to decorate the opera ceiling by Charles Garnier, who designed everything in the opera house right down to the last door knob.”
The Palais Garnier will be closed for renovation from 2027 to 2032. Carayon said that in his letter to President Macron, he suggested alternating the Lenepveu and Chagall ceilings, with each being shown for a decade. The Chagall ceiling was designed to be removable, says Carayon. “The debate over the Chagall ceiling has gone on for more than 60 years,” Alexander Neef, the director of the Paris Opera said in an interview with Le Monde, “The Lenepveu ceiling has been listed as a historic monument since 1923 so its heritage value is recognised. That his descendants wish to defend his memory is legitimate.”