Jeu de Paume - Photography Art Center
The “Jeu de Paume” is considered in France as the first form of Tennis. This “Jeu de Paume” location is not to be confused with the “Salle du Jeu de Paume” located in Versailles and where the famous “Oath of the Tennis Court” took place at the beginning of the French Revolution.

The Jeu de Paume was indeed a place to play tennis from its creation in 1861. It started welcoming art fifty years later and has been the Art Center dedicated to Photography since 2004.

Both the Jeu de Paume and the Orangerie (on the other side of the Tuileries Gardens) were built within a ten year period (1852-1861) and purposely mirror each other perfectly with very similar architecture and Ionic columns.

The major difference between the two buildings? The Jeu de Paume’s facade displays the Imperial “N” due to Napoleon III who commissioned it in 1861. It was he who had also commissioned the “Orangerie’ in 1852, however, at that time, he was « simply » the President, not yet the Emperor…