Maillol’s muse at fifteen, an imprisoned Resistance fighter, a singer of Gulag songs and a discoverer of artists: Dina Vierny lived many lives in one. From 13 January 2027, the Musée Maillol in Paris will dedicate a major exhibition to her, exceptionally spanning all three floors of the museum. Through major works by Maillol, Matisse, Bonnard, Poliakoff, Duchamp, Séraphine and many others, alongside numerous previously unseen documents, the exhibition traces the extraordinary life of a woman who went from model to gallerist to become one of the leading figures of the twentieth-century art world. This inaugural tribute also marks the museum’s rebirth, as her grandsons, Pierre and Alexandre Lorquin, take over its direction.

In 1934, Dina Vierny was just fifteen when she met Aristide Maillol and became his last great model. Their relationship seems to reverse the myth of Pygmalion: having inspired the sculptor, she would devote much of her life to championing his work, eventually founding two museums in his memory. Her path is almost unparalleled in art history, with the model becoming the guardian of the artist’s legacy. Yet her life extended far beyond this encounter. A figure of the Popular Front generation, a Resistance fighter during the Second World War and imprisoned for her activities, Dina Vierny became a passionate gallerist and collector after the war. From Matisse to Duchamp, from naïve painters to Poliakoff, she championed artists with widely differing visions. From the 1960s onwards, she travelled to the USSR, helping to smuggle out works by nonconformist artists, including Ilya Kabakov and Erik Bulatov.

For Dina Vierny, art was never confined to galleries or museums. One evening, after a day at her gallery, she stood in for a singer at a Parisian cabaret, accompanied on guitar by Serge Poliakoff, who had come to introduce himself and show her his paintings. Captivated, she exhibited his work and gave him his first major success. A bookseller after her gallery closed for the evening and an insatiable collector, she assembled more than eighty collections over the course of her life, revealing a seemingly boundless curiosity. These included an internationally acclaimed collection of dolls and automata, as well as historic horse-drawn carriages that she hired out to film productions. These many passions reveal a personality that defies any single definition.

Through paintings, sculptures, drawings, photographs and numerous previously unseen archival documents, the exhibition explores Dina Vierny’s many facets and the encounters that shaped her life. Bringing together works by the artists she inspired, collected and championed, it offers a journey through the artistic and political history of the twentieth century. The exhibition is curated by Thierry Dufrêne, Professor of Art History at Université Paris Nanterre, whose curatorial projects include the 2024 Surrealism exhibition at the Centre Pompidou.

This exhibition opens a new chapter in the history of the Musée Maillol – Fondation Dina Vierny. After fifteen years of externally managed programming, Pierre and Alexandre Lorquin, the founder’s grandsons, are taking over the museum’s artistic direction, with the ambition of reaffirming Maillol’s modernity and fostering a dialogue between modern art and contemporary creation. With a new visual identity by design agency Z-O-O, visitor reception areas redesigned with designer Nathan Baranes, and a previously inaccessible 300 m² paved courtyard opening to the public, the museum is becoming a vibrant place of discovery in the heart of Saint-Germain-des-Prés. On the lower ground floor, PADAM, the lively restaurant from Laurent de Gourcuff (Paris Society), with interiors by Daphné Desjeux, also revives the musical spirit of the former dressing rooms of La Fontaine des Quatre-Saisons, the celebrated Left Bank cabaret.