Several Paris museums including the Louvre, the Musée d'Orsay, the Musée de l'Orangerie, and the Musée National Picasso will be closed on Saturday, October 24 ahead of planned protests calling for educational reform, lower cost of living, and an end to police violence.
The announcement, reported by French media, follows Art Basel Paris's publicized decision to end the fair early on Friday night and close for the two remaining public days.
Private foundations and commercial galleries also announced their preliminary Saturday closures. The Fondation Cartier website notes that it will be closed on Saturday and Sunday, while Fondation Louis Vuitton states that it will be closed on Saturday.
Some of the city’s commercial galleries, many of which are also Art Basel Paris exhibitors, have publicized their Saturday closures on their websites and social media pages, among them Gagosian, Esther Schipper, and Perrotin. Galerie Lelong's Paris location confirmed with Hyperallergic that it will remain open this weekend.
French authorities have moved to ban “illegitimate” protests nationwide and will deploy military troops and increased police presence in Paris and other major cities on Saturday. Demonstration requests filed by registered labor unions will be examined in accordance with the law and potentially required to utilize alternative routes.
A forthcoming large-scale union-led rally, originally scheduled for this Saturday outside the Grand Palais in protest of Art Basel Paris, has updated its location to Place de la Bastille after the fair's premature closure and an order to refrain from entering the city center.
The National Union of Visual Artists (SNAP–CGT), which called for the rally outside Art Basel Paris, told Hyperallergic that the protest’s aim is “to defend culture for everyone and decent conditions for art workers.”
“That the fair is canceling its weekend under pressure from the social movement is a victory,” said a representative from the group. “Let us keep the movement going, in support of the demands of high-school and university students and to build the strike.”