The Musée du Montparnasse is a museum

Museum

A museum is an institution that cares for a collection of artifacts and other objects of scientific, artistic, cultural, or historical importance and makes them available for public viewing through exhibits that may be permanent or temporary. Most large museums are located in major cities...

 at 21 Avenue du Maine, in the 15th arrondissement, Montparnasse Quarter

Montparnasse

Montparnasse is an area of Paris, France, on the left bank of the river Seine, centred at the crossroads of the Boulevard du Montparnasse and the Rue de Rennes, between the Rue de Rennes and boulevard Raspail...

 of Paris

Paris

Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

, France.

The museum opened its doors on May 28, 1998. Located at the former site

Historic preservation

Historic preservation is an endeavor that seeks to preserve, conserve and protect buildings, objects, landscapes or other artifacts of historical significance...

 of the early-1900s atelier of the Russian painter

Painting

Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a surface . The application of the medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush but other objects can be used. In art, the term painting describes both the act and the result of the action. However, painting is...

, Marie Vassilieff

Marie Vassilieff

Mariya Ivanovna Vassiliéva , , better known as Marie Vassilieff, was a Russian painter....

, the museum was founded by Roger Pic and Jean-Marie Drot

Jean-Marie Drot

Jean-Marie Drot is a French writer and documentary maker. He was the director of the French Academy in Rome from 1984 to 1994. Drot is noted for his documentary work on Montparnasse.- Publications :...

 as a nonprofit operation.

The museum provides visitors with a history of the multitude of artists who came from around the world to live and work in Montparnasse at the beginning of the twentieth century plus, the museum puts on temporary exhibition

Art exhibition

Art exhibitions are traditionally the space in which art objects meet an audience. The exhibit is universally understood to be for some temporary period unless, as is rarely true, it is stated to be a "permanent exhibition". In American English, they may be called "exhibit", "exposition" or...

s of works by Montparnasse artists, both past and present.

For years, both before and during World War I, Marie Vassilieff also operated what was registered as a private club that acted as a canteen for artists where food and drink were provided as cheaply as possible to struggling painters such as, Amedeo Modigliani

Amedeo Modigliani

Amedeo Clemente Modigliani was an Italian painter and sculptor who worked mainly in France. Primarily a figurative artist, he became known for paintings and sculptures in a modern style characterized by mask-like faces and elongation of form...

, Chaim Soutine

Chaim Soutine

Chaïm Soutine was a Jewish painter from Belarus. Soutine made a major contribution to the expressionist movement while living in Paris....

, Pablo Picasso

Pablo Picasso

Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso known as Pablo Ruiz Picasso was a Spanish expatriate painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, and stage designer, one of the greatest and most influential artists of the...

, and others.

Before long it became the gathering place for many others in the area and, by 1913, Vassilieff's canteen was so widely-known that painter, sculptor, and filmmaker, Fernand Léger

Fernand Léger

Joseph Fernand Henri Léger was a French painter, sculptor, and filmmaker. In his early works he created a personal form of Cubism which he gradually modified into a more figurative, populist style...

, gave two lectures there on the topic of Modern art

Modern art

Modern art includes artistic works produced during the period extending roughly from the 1860s to the 1970s, and denotes the style and philosophy of the art produced during that era. The term is usually associated with art in which the traditions of the past have been thrown aside in a spirit of...

.

Today, as part of a membership

Group (sociology)

In the social sciences a social group can be defined as two or more humans who interact with one another, share similar characteristics and collectively have a sense of unity...

program, the Musée du Montparnasse offers a once-a-month evening meeting where members gather to enjoy a variety of cultural events.